


Burning Bright

by rufeepeach



Series: Burning Bright [3]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: AU where Neal is alive, F/M, Rewrite, Swanfire - Freeform, season 5 rewrite
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-10
Updated: 2016-02-06
Packaged: 2018-05-01 00:23:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 12
Words: 78,621
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5185193
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rufeepeach/pseuds/rufeepeach
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Neal had survived to the start of Season 5, and Hook was the one to die? An attempted rewrite of the fifth season, episode-by-episode, with Neal in the place of Hook as Emma’s main love interest. Swanfire + all the canon relationships.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Dark Swan

**Author's Note:**

> Neal survived Quiet Minds and was the one to accompany Emma into the past at the end of season 3; Ariel didn’t show up in Poor Unfortunate Souls, so Hook drowned (so the 'major character death' warning is for that). Assume everything else is the same unless stated otherwise.

Emma vanishes; for a moment, Neal forgets how to breathe.

Then a voice comes, then several, all muffled as though shouted through water, and he realises that one of them is his own. “No! No, no no no no no no!” He’s running, his feet a blur on the concrete, but he stops short when he comes to that twisted, evil piece of metal, lying untouched on the road. The last time Neal had a family, it ended when his father’s name showed on that cold metal. Now, history repeats itself, and his mind screams and freezes and refuses to understand even while his eyes read the words emblazoned there: Emma Swan.

“Where did she go?” Snow cries. Neal, whose father never vanished anywhere, who saw the last Dark One rise and slaughter his enemies without a second spent elsewhere, has no answer.

They all stand in stunned, disbelieving silence, staring at the space where Emma is not. 

Regina makes to reach for the dagger first: Neal whirls around and stands in her way. No one is touching that evil, wicked thing, the thing that could control Emma’s every move. Neal spent a year trapped in the body of a Dark One enslaved, and he knows how dreadful the compulsion would feel to her. He will not make her suffer that way. 

“Get out of my way,” Regina snarls, but Neal stares her down. Regina sighs, and tries a different tack, reasonable and placating. “It’s the only way to summon her home,” she says, patiently. “Unless you want to leave her to suffer alone wherever the dark vortex of doom has taken her?”

“Whatever that thing does Emma will fight it!” Snow declares, as if she understands a thing about this terrible curse. “She will still be good!”

“That vortex of doom look like a world of rainbows from where you were standing?” Regina demands, and Snow falls silent, although Neal knows nothing will convince Emma’s mother that Emma can’t defeat any evil that comes her way.

Neal knows different. From long ago and far away, someone else’s words filter down to him: ‘I could turn it toward good: I’d save all the children’.

“We’re not using the dagger to control her, not even to bring her back here,” Neal tells her, and he means it. “No one is using it at all, ever.”

“You’d sacrifice our only way to find out where she’s gone on principle?” Regina demands, and Neal levels a glare that used to frighten even the hardiest Lost Boys.

“I’d sacrifice convenience for Emma’s trust in us, yes,” he snaps back, and Regina recoils. That’s something Neal’s learned from his father, one of the few good things: that drastic short term solutions are no substitute for long-term planning. “If we use the dagger on her now we become her captors, her enemies, and it won’t matter how good our intentions are. And anyhow, there’s another way to summon a Dark One, as you should know.”

“Then go right ahead,” Regina gestures to him, disdainful as ever. “Shout at the empty air and see what happens.”

Neal turns away from her, and closes his eyes, breathing deep and hoping that the same true love that preserved their swan necklace will allow her to hear his call now. “Emma Swan,” he says, “Emma Swan, Emma Swan.”

Nothing happens.

“Well, that answers that then,” Regina announces through the gaping silence, as Neal’s mind spins. “She’s left this realm: she’s beyond all summons. Even the wishing well wouldn’t supercharge it.”

“The knife wouldn’t get her back either, in that case,” Neal retorts. He reaches down and draws his scarf from around his neck, taking care not to touch the blade as he wraps it in fabric. “No one is touching this,” he tells them as he straightens, as if they’ve ever listened to him before, as if he has any authority at all. “We’ll find someplace safe for it, or someone we can trust not to use it.”

“My vault would do just as well,” Regina sulks, but for once Robin looks at her with a little reproach, and she falls silent. Neal nods his thanks.

“No offence, Regina,” he says, “But there aren’t many people I’d trust with this, myself included.”

“And especially not the Evil Queen,” Regina adds, snidely. “Yes, I get the message.”

“Maybe she’s right, Neal,” Snow says then. “Maybe we should keep hold of that, just in case.”

“The only time it’d be okay to use this,” he replies, gesturing to the innocuous little bundle in his hand, “Is if someone’s life was in danger, and it was the only way to stop her. And even then it’s a last resort.” He looks up, away from the helpless royals, and feels a bolt of remorse for his unforgiving tone. Snow has lost her daughter, after all, and she’s only trying to help. 

He starts toward the shop without looking back. The others fall into step behind him, and he can’t say he’s surprised.

Belle’s managed to lift Rumpelstiltskin onto a low couch in the back room, by the time they return, a fact for which Neal is grateful. For all the bullshit his father put them through since his wedding to Belle, Neal can feel a deep pit of anxiety gnawing at his stomach as he sees his father lying there, still as the grave, with no way of knowing if he’ll ever wake up. The last thing Neal said to him… well, he didn’t know those would be the last words he said when he said them, did he? 

And he can’t dwell on that anyway right now, not with Emma missing and cursed. The Apprentice is still collapsed on the cot in the back, and Neal tears his attention from his prone father to listen to what the old man has to say.

—

Regina wasn’t strong enough to use the wand.

It’s a surprise to Neal, since from all he’s heard she’s a child abductor and a mass murderer, but apparently a few years of patchy good behaviour goes a long way. Once again, Neal is forced to wonder whether, without the curse that has now swallowed the woman he loves, his father might have accomplished the same transformation.

“He’d be strong enough,” Belle murmurs. The rest of the group have left to go consider their options and get a good night’s sleep, and they’re left at his father’s bedside. “And he’d do it if we asked.”

“We don’t know what he’d do now,” Neal reminds her. “We… we don’t know who he’ll be if he wakes up.”

“When,” Belle corrects, sternly, reminding both of them of the hope they have to cling to. “When he wakes up, we’ll go from there.” She looks up at him, reassuring, and strokes her husband’s cheek with the backs of her knuckles while holding Neal’s hand with the other. “Anyway, you’d know better than me who he’s likely to be. I’ve never… I’ve never known him without the curse.”

It’s a soft reminder, gentle and subtle, to a conversation they’d had months ago. It was after she’d banished Rumpelstiltskin without a word to anyone: he’d accused her of lacking perspective, of being incapable of the understanding Rumpelstiltskin himself had always praised in her. She’d only met him when he’d been cursed for three hundred years already: how could she know who he really was? She’d countered with the memory of what his father had almost done to Hook, of the lies he’d told to them both, and of his justifications, his inability to apologise. How he’d done it for the pair of them, even knowing that they’d hate him for if they knew what he was doing. He hadn’t accepted that, he’d been angry that she’d banished his father without talking to him about it first, and they’d not spoken for some time after that.

Then Rumpelstiltskin had returned with three witches at his back, and all hell had broken loose.  Neal had been forced to agree with her, for even when he’d tried to reason with his father, there had been no changing his mind. Rumpelstiltskin simply couldn’t see a future where he was powerless and his family were safe. Neal had seen then that no matter how deeply they loved him, it was impossible to stand by him when he’d lost himself so totally to the darkness. 

The same darkness that has now claimed Emma. 

Neal can’t shake the feeling he’s trapped in a nightmare, his childhood repeating itself, and he once again incapable of helping, of saving anyone from this curse that has so completely devoured his life. He wonders if perhaps he’s in shock: there’s no way in hell he should be able to think straight right now, and yet here he is.

Maybe the emotional breakdown will come later, he thinks. Or maybe he’s just survived so much traumatic bullshit from too many sides at this point that he’s desensitised.

“What’re they going to try now?” Belle asks, when Neal says nothing in response to her comment, too lost in his thoughts. “If Regina isn’t strong enough?”

“I’m honestly worried they’ll go to her psychotic sister,” Neal replies, glancing down at his father’s sleeping face. He remembers all too well the atrocities Zelena is capable of: he shared most of his father’s enslavement. Emma only managed to separate them bare weeks before Zelena was defeated. The witch’s mocking laughter and cruel orders still resonate sometimes in his nightmares.

It was worse for Rumpelstiltskin. Zelena left him alone when Neal was in charge of their body, but when it was Rumpelstiltskin she took delight in abusing him, torturing him, forcing him to say and do unspeakable things for her own satisfaction. Neal can’t imagine what she might have done once they were separated, and his father was lucid again. She’d always taunted him that it was less fun destroying someone who was already half-mad. 

When Neal had learned that she’d tortured him again in New York he’d been wracked by guilt. He was ashamed that he’d not understood earlier the source of his father’s terror, his near deranged pursuit of power and safety above all else. It made sense that if Zelena had resurfaced, if she wasn’t dead but alive and out for revenge, then Rumpelstiltskin would spiral out of all control. But by the time Emma had told him who they’d found in New York, it had been too late to help.

“If she could find Emma…” Belle murmurs, “How far are you willing to go for her, Bae?”

Belle and Rumpelstiltskin are the only people Neal allows to call him that. In this moment it’s both a comfort and a reminder that he’s still no more capable than he was as a boy of fourteen, watching his father grow into a demon he could barely recognise. 

“I can’t go near her,” Neal replies, with a shudder. “You weren’t there, Belle, you can’t imagine what she’s capable of.”

“I saw the fallout, though,” Belle reminds him. “I bore the brunt of it, remember?”

“Yeah,” Neal nods. He remembers the lies and the betrayal, how deeply Belle’s heart had been broken. Equally he recalls how angry he’d been at her at first for how she’d chosen to mend it. The sight of her with a younger man so soon after she’d cast his father out of their lives without a word had cut him deep. “I remember.”

“Go help them,” Belle prompts him. “Before they decide to let the witch out of her cell or something equally stupid.”

“You should come too, you know,” Neal says, standing up. “You’re smarter than the rest of us combined, and without papa we can use all the real knowledge we can get.”

“I’m more needed here,” Belle tells him, softly, her hand still stroking Rumpelstiltskin’s temple. “If he… if he goes, I don’t want him to be alone. I want to be here with him, I… I owe him that.”

“If anything changes…”

“I’ll call you,” she assures him. “I promise, Bae. He won’t go without you.”

“He won’t go at all,” Neal mutters fiercely. “I have too much left to say to that old bastard to let him die on me.”

Belle lets out a sad little laugh at that, “I’m sure he’ll be glad to hear that… when he wakes up.”

He watches her for a moment, trying to think of what to say to her. They’ve a lot of ground to make up, Neal and his step-mother. There’s the ground lost when he didn’t notice his father’s degeneration, too busy being protective of Henry during the Snow Queen’s reign.  He wasn’t on hand to help Belle cope with her husband’s betrayal, wasn’t there to help Rumpelstiltskin return to them. There was yet more ground gone when she banished his own father without consulting him, knowing he couldn’t chase after him without leaving his son alone with no assurance he could return. He’d been all but cruel to her over Will, hurt and angry as he was. This is all but their first real conversation since they’d found his father holding Hook’s heart in the clocktower.

They should have been a team, Neal thinks. It should have been the pair of them helping his father through the trauma of Zelena’s abuses, and the ever-worsening condition of his curse.  They should have been the people he could rely on and trust. Instead they believed his transparent lies, because they were easier than hard truth. 

He’d lied to them, betrayed them, done terrible things in their names, but he was also broken and they let him fool them, even knowing them as they did. Neal hasn’t enough faith in goodness and light as absolute concepts to believe they aren’t at least a little culpable too. He’s not sure now that Rumpelstiltskin could ever have resisted the allure of the hat without their help, however hard he had tried

“Thank you for being here with him, Belle,” Neal says, at last. “I’m really glad he has you here.”

“We’ve got a lot to talk about as well, when he wakes up,” Belle sighs. “We’ve not been everything we should have been to each other… I can’t make up for that by just making sure he isn’t alone now.”

“Neither can I,” Neal agrees. “But it’s a start, right?”

“Yes,” Belle’s eyes slide back to her husband, wistful and sad. “It’s a start.”

—

They have a plan: they’re going to meet at Regina’s office in the morning, and work out how to find Emma. Until then, everyone is to try to sleep - it might be a long time, after all, before anyone gets another chance.

Neal doesn’t go back to his room at Granny’s, where he’s basically taken up residence in the past year he’s been in town. Instead, remembering a story Emma told him a while ago, he goes to the castle by the water. 

It’s late, too late, the middle of the night, but he thinks he knows where to find his kid. And there, sure enough, is Henry, sitting on the little castle, kicking his feet.

“Emma told me they tore this place down,” Neal says, by way of greeting. Henry looks up and tries to offer a small smile.

“My mom… Regina restored it when the curse broke,” Henry tells him. “She was trying to win me back, I guess, after she nearly killed me and all?” He sighs, and Neal thinks it’s a sigh far too big for a kid his age. But then, Henry’s a teenager now, no longer the cute little child he was when Neal first met him. And he’s seen far more shit for anyone his age than he should have. 

“Yeah, Emma mentioned that too,” Neal nods, trying to pretend he hadn’t wanted to strangle Regina when he’d been informed of that little development. “Your mom said you used to come here to think.”

“I didn’t wanna think,” Henry admits, “I just… wanted to remember. Back when everything was easier, you know? The first day my mom was in town, after I found her, she came and found me here. She told me she didn’t want to be the savior, that she couldn’t save the town. But she did, she stayed anyway, and she saved everyone, lots of times.”

“She stayed for you,” Neal clarifies, clambering up onto the wooden structure to sit beside Henry. He wraps an arm around the boy’s shoulders, and Henry leans in and rests his head against his dad’s side. No matter how long he lives, Neal knows he’ll never get enough of holding his son. “She stayed because she wanted to know you. Just like I did.”

“I’m glad you stayed, dad,” Henry says. “I’m glad I got to know you.”

“So am I,” Neal agrees. He tries to keep smiling, to not show his son how happy he is to hear him say that, even in the midst of all this tragedy. “And we’re going to get through this. We’ll save Emma and be a family again, in any way we can.”

“It’s just I always… I think I always assumed that if one of my moms was going to go super evil, it would be Regina. I never thought this would happen to Emma.”

“You never see it coming,” Neal says, a little heavily. “Did I ever tell you about what my papa was like before this happened to him?”

“No,” Henry shakes his head. “Wasn’t he a coward?”

“That’s what everyone said,” Neal agrees, “But I never thought it was true. He didn’t fight in the war because he wanted to be with me, he didn’t want to die before he got to have his family. He even took on the curse because he thought it was the only way to save me from the same war. Your grandpa was a good man, before the curse. After… well, you know what came after. But he was a good father to me, and everything he ever did was to keep me safe.”

“So you’re telling me mom’s going to be evil now, despite all the good she did before?” Henry asks, his voice growing a little anxious. “That’s not reassuring me, dad.”

“No,” Neal sighs, and runs his free hand through his messy hair. “No, Henry, what I’m saying… what I’m saying is no matter how bad he got, he’s never ever stopped loving me. Even when I couldn’t love him back, even when I hated him. Everything he did was for me before he was cursed, and that never changed. Your mom will still love you, no matter what happens now. She’ll still want you safe. You have nothing to fear from her.”

“I’m not afraid of what she might do to me,” Henry tells him. “I’m afraid of what she might do to protect me. Grandpa killed people to keep you safe, right? How do you live with that?”

“Kid, if I ever get an answer to that one, I’ll let you know,” Neal admits. Henry smiles just a little because this has always been their way: no matter how uncomfortable it is, Henry knows his father will tell him the truth. Another thing Neal learned from his own father’s example, albeit in reverse. 

“We’re gonna find her, right?” Henry asks then. “We’ll get her back, we’ll save her? Before she kills anyone?”

“Of course we are,” Neal assures him. “We’re team hero, remember?”

Henry laughs at that, “That’s a sucky name, dad.”

“Okay, well, you’re the guy with the names,” Neal reminds him. “What was the last one? Operation Mongoose?”

“Yeah, cause the one against my mom was Cobra, and mongooses eat cobras.”

“Mongooses?” Neal muses, “I thought it was mongeese.” He nudges Henry a little, who manages another little laugh. 

Neal realises then why he hasn’t freaked out yet: why even though the worst thing imaginable has happened, his father close to death and his true love become the Dark One, he’s holding it together. It’s because Belle needs her support, and Henry needs his father, and Emma needs her best friend, and Rumpelstiltskin needs his son. He can’t fall apart, not when everyone he cares about needs him to hold them together.

“What should we name it, then?” Neal asks, trying to keep his son’s mind on something other than the doom that has fallen on them all. “Operation Desert? Cobras and mongooses are desert dwellers, right?”

Henry shakes his head, “No. This one comes with a name. It’s really obvious.”

“What is it, then?”

“Operation White Swan,” Henry says, heavily, and Neal nods because yes, of course, it’s perfect. Then his voice chokes, and Neal hugs him close, and keeps holding on for dear life as Henry cries into the front of his jacket.

They walk back to the car in silence. Neal drives Henry home to his grandparents’, making sure Snow has him safe and Charming knows how upset he is. Then he turns away, and starts making tracks for his room at Granny’s.

He’s just heading for the stairs when Snow’s soft voice calls him back. “You should stay, Neal,” Snow says. “Sleep in Emma’s bed. Henry could use his dad here tonight.”

Neal nods, accepting the offer and grateful as always for their utter devotion to their grandson, and steps inside.

—

Neal underestimated the other people in Emma’s life: no one has been fool enough to suggest using Zelena to open the portal.

“What about a magic bean?” Snow suggests, after they’ve been talking for a while in Regina’s office and no one seems to have any more ideas. “They’ve worked before.”

“We’d have to know where to send it,” Regina shakes her head. “The Apprentice said the wand would take us to Emma, wherever she is. A bean could take us to any realm but what then? Do we comb the entire Enchanted Forest for one scaly woman?”

“I know where to find her.” Neal turns in surprise at Belle’s voice: he’d thought she’d be at his father’s bedside come hell or high water. She carries an odd frosted bell-jar in her hands, and when her palm moves a little he can make out a rose inside.

Neal cringes a little, knowing he’s the only person in the room who could understand the reference. He knows even before he asks what the rose is for: when the last petal falls, his father will be dead. His eyes stray to it throughout the rest of the meeting, but nothing changes.

“Where?” Regina demands, and Belle moves into the room, heels clacking on the parquet floor. 

“The Dark One’s Vault.” Belle sounds breathless, as if she’d run to the office the moment she’d worked it out. “Neal’s been there too: it’s where we resurrected Rumple after he died killing Pan.”

“She might not have stayed there,” Neal points out. “It wasn’t exactly pleasant, if you remember.”

“I know,” Belle nods, “but it’s a start, and from there we might be able to pick up her trail. I did a little research from the books we used last time: the Vault was close to Camelot, if you cross through a kingdom called Dunbroch. Emma will be heading toward Camelot to find Merlin, and Dunbroch is famous for-”

“Will-o-the-wisps,” Regina nods, smiling now, catching on. “We used to trade for them in my kingdom. They’re very useful for finding lost people.”

“You mean useful for chasing me,” Snow corrects, with a small smile. “How many did you get through before you caught me?”

“You were very good at evasive manoeuvres,” Regina purses her lips, “I’ll grant you that.”

Snow laughs a little at that. Neal once again marvels at how these two have managed to become genuine friends, despite never letting go of their joint past. 

“Will-o-the-wisps are most easily found in the Stone Circle. It’s halfway between Dunbroch and Camelot,” Belle continues. “If Emma’s seeking Merlin, she might have gotten there already, and if not, then a wisp will help us find her.”

“It’s as good a plan as any,” Charming decides. “We can’t go alone, though. We should take as many people as possible to help search the forest.”

They agree to that quickly, despite some reservations about roping in the dwarves. Then Regina and Snow insist upon bringing all small children along, Robin’s boy Roland, and Emma’s baby brother Leo.

“But what about papa?” Neal asks after a while, turning to Belle. “I don’t like the idea of us leaving him here all alone.”

“The Apprentice said he’ll be in stasis until something can revive him,” Belle explains. Her hands clench in front of her, betraying her anxiety, while that ominous jar rests at her side. “And the Blue Fairy confirmed it. We can’t take him along and I don’t think anything here can help him. The wisps might be able to help me find something to save him as well as Emma. I’m doing no one any good sitting at his bedside waiting for the last petal to fall.”

Neal agrees, despite disliking the thought of his father left all alone. Belle is right: actively helping far away is better than passively watching his father grow weaker and weaker, closer to death. “Okay,” he says, “okay, but someone has to check on him.”

“The fairies have agreed to help,” Belle tells him. “I know he doesn’t like them in the least, but Blue’s the only magic user not already coming along who can defend him if something happens.”

“Speaking of magic users,” Regina says then, “I can’t leave Zelena behind.” There’re protests from many sides, but she raises a hand for silence. “We’ll tie her up and bring her with us, powerless. But if she stays here it’s only a matter of time before she gets out.”

“I agree,” Belle says, surprising Neal due to their mutual loathing for the Wicked Witch. “We can’t bring Rumple along as he is, and I won’t leave her unattended where he’s unprotected.”

“Then it’s settled,” Regina smiles. “I’ll get the witch, everyone else round up whoever’s willing to come along, and we’ll meet at Granny’s in an hour.”

—

The spell Regina casts is like a large net, which will allow the whole building and everyone in it to travel through the portal together. They crash land in the Enchanted Forest with an almighty crash. Belle and Granny agree to join Leroy on Witch Duty, while Zelena sulks around the napkin Neal lodged in her mouth. He couldn’t stand to hear her voice, so frequently heard in his nightmares, and no one had argued.

Neal and Henry are the first out of the doors, followed closely by Snow, Charming, Robin and Regina. The Stone Circle is only a short walk from where they’ve crash landed, and after twenty four hours of sitting around, Neal needs the exercise to burn off the excess energy. Henry keeps equal pace with him, anxious as he is to find his mother, but none of them hope to find her there.

When they catch sight of a familiar blonde head and sharp profile, Neal and Henry break into a dead run, followed closely by the others. They slow when, from behind one of the rocks, another figure appears. Neal makes out a bright redhead in a blue dress, clearly frightened and bent over in a horribly familiar posture.

“Emma, no!” Neal cries, and all but flies to her side, stopping short only when it’s confirmed that she holds the redhead’s heart in her hand. “Emma, put her heart back. Come on, you can do it, please, don’t do this.”

“Neal?” Emma blinks as if lost in a daze, then her eyes snap back to the redhead. “It’s the only way,” she murmurs, strangely, and squeezes the heart. Neal can guess who she’s talking to, because he’s seen it before. A few times, in the early days of his curse, Rumpelstiltskin would also address voices who weren’t there, and they were never saying good things

“Yes it’s me, Emma, Emma hey, look at me, come on look at me,” he leaned in close, trying to break her line of sight. “Stay with me now, look at me.”

She tore her eyes from the woman in front of her, but when her gaze turned on him Neal could hardly breathe, because there was no light in her eyes. Nothing there but a dead-eyed, blank stare: the stare of a person locked in a battle for their own mind, with little recognition of the outside world. She hadn’t accepted her darkness yet, thank the Gods, but it was clearly a matter of time.

“I know it’s telling you to do this,” Neal tells her, in a low murmur. “Emma, I’ve seen this before. This happened to my father, too. You know it did.”

“He was weak,” Emma breathes, as if the words themselves are a groan of pain. “He couldn’t contain it, or stop it. I can if I just…” she squeezes the heart again, almost compulsively, and the redhead gasps in mortal agony.

“No!” Neal cries, “No, Emma, no that’s what it wants. Whatever it tells you to do, however it tries to tempt you, don’t ever, ever do it. You can only beat it if you defy it. My father… my father was powerless, friendless, loveless. All he had was me, and I was just a boy then. He was all alone, but you’re not. I’m a man now, I can help you, and so can everyone else who loves you. You have power of your own, you don’t need the darkness to protect you or your family.”

“I need the wisp,” Emma gasps, “without it I… I can’t find Merlin.”

“We can get another,” Neal begs. “Or steal hers the old fashioned way,” he tries for a joke, to ignite a little of her old self. There’s still no light in her eyes, no flash of the woman he loves so very, very much. “Emma you can’t let this take you away from us, from Henry. If you do this you’ll lose everything, and you won’t be strong enough to fight if you don’t start now.”

“I can’t… I….”

“Mom!” Henry all but pushes to his father’s side, and Neal steps over willingly, giving Henry space to face his mother. “Mom listen to dad, please, you don’t have to do this.”

“I can’t be your mom like this, Henry,” Emma all but weeps, her hand shaking, her eyes wild and desperate but still hard and cold. “I need to beat it, and she’ll steal my only chance.”

“There’s a thousand chances, mom!” Henry assures her. “You told me once you wanted me to have my best chance to be a hero, to be good. I want the same for you, and this isn’t the way. You can still be that person, mom, you can be a hero, but you have to stop!”

“Henry…” Emma moans, agonised. Her whole body slumps as she all but falls forward, shoving the redhead’s heart back into her chest.

She’s breathing heavily as the redhead catches her bearings and backs away, horrified. Emma collapses into Neal’s arms, and he clutches her close, more thankful than he’s ever been to have her safe in his arms once more. Almost simultaneously one arm from each of them comes out to encircle their son. Together they stand for a long moment, clutching each other like the world is ending. For all Neal knows, it could well be.

Neal tries to enjoy the moment, to believe this is progress. But there were many times in those early days before when he begged his father to stop, and his father had listened. It never seemed to make a dent in the darkness’ progress through Rumpelstiltskin’s soul: Neal knows it will take more than one good choice and a hug to break this curse.

“Here,” he says to her, when she pulls away a little and there’s room. He reaches into the bag at his hip, and pulls out the scarf-wrapped dagger. He’d thought about giving it to Henry, but Emma’s the only one who can decide what should be done with the object capable of controlling her. “I believe this is yours.”

“Thank you,” she breathes, and accepts it, holding it gingerly in her fingertips. “How did you find me?” Emma asks then, stepping away from them completely. Snow and Charming surge forward, each hugging their daughter for themselves, and Neal sighs with gratitude to see Emma’s spark back behind her eyes, and her real voice coming through again, the darkness having receded a little for now.

“We dragged Granny’s through a portal,” Regina tells her, getting a hug for herself before surrendering Emma back to Henry. “Everyone’s here to help.”

“We’re going to save you, mom,” Henry tells her, as devout as the truest believer he has always been. “You’re not alone.”

Emma’s eyes cast back behind her, and catch Neal’s. She doesn’t thank him, but he knows what she means, and he nods. “I’m not losing another person I love to this,” he tells her, quietly, almost for their ears only. “We’re going to beat it, together.”

She nods, as if he can possibly be sure of that, and then the redhead catches her attention. He allows Emma time to be her heroic self, while she can, happy to stand back and watch her talk things out with the other woman, whose name is apparently Merida. 

He tries to be calm, to let her do as she will, to not step in and demand her attention. He doesn’t argue when she hands the dagger to Regina, even if he can’t imagine a circumstance under which he’d let her use it. It isn’t as if they’re together, married or committed; it’s not as if he has a right to her now the danger has passed. If she needs him, she’ll let him know. Her last lover died so recently that Neal had felt it intrusive to step in so quickly, for all he knows his feelings aren’t a secret. He’d thought he had all the time in the world to let her heal, and yet again he wonders if he stalled too long, and it is now too late.

Hook had drowned only a few weeks ago, after the sea witch cast him unconscious from the deck of his own ship, into the unforgiving ocean. Emma had stalked into the woods, murderous and fierce, ready to avenge yet another lover murdered. Neal had had to catch her and quietly usher her to her bed, so she could mourn without the benefit of weaponry, where she could be watched and comforted in safety. 

It had been down to Regina and Emma’s father to quietly return Ursula’s ability to sing and reunite her with her father, so she could leave town and never return. They were as angry as anyone, of course, but Ursula was all but tangental to the real issue here. They’d been worried enough that Rumpelstiltskin’s twisted plan to darken her would succeed before. If Emma had murdered Ursula in vengeance that day, then there would have been no going back.

Of course, all that effort has gone to waste now. No matter what state Emma was in before the curse took hold, every choice she makes will now be a constant battle for her soul, her natural light battling the invading darkness. Neal has to wonder if things would be easier for her now  if Hook had been rescued in time, if she wasn’t still grieving yet another loved one lost. Neal had had his own issues with Hook, but the pirate had made Emma happy, and Neal couldn’t wish for anything that brought her as much pain as his death had.

This thing Neal has with Emma - long-lived and binding, tragic and wonderful, not quite love and yet certainly nothing else -  is a confusing mess at the best of times. It feels selfish and cruel to confront her with all those painful, difficult feelings, when something so much more important is happening to her. She doesn’t need him as a lover right now: she needs people who love her absolutely, and require nothing in return. His personal feelings are insignificant by comparison to the struggle for her soul. She needs to know that no matter what she feels or does, he’ll stand by her and help her back to the light.

He can do that, he decides, as they head back to Granny’s. He can love her however she needs to be loved. He made her that promise, silently, the moment he saw her again in Neverland; he will continue to keep it until his dying breath.

—

The world rocks and shakes around them. Neal covers Henry’s head with his arm to protect him from broken glass or falling ornaments, as Granny’s crashes back into Storybrooke.

His clothing is far richer than anything he’s ever worn before, and so is everyone else’s. They look like they just stepped out of a high quality renaissance faire, and Neal feels cold dread sinking into his stomach. Something has happened, and he can’t remember a thing.

It’s confirmed when two dwarves run inside. Six weeks. They’ve been gone six whole weeks, and can remember not a second of it.

And Emma is missing.

His blood runs cold when he realises that he can’t see her. Neal runs for the door, runs to find her, when, as if his anxiety summoned her, Emma appears. 

His heart all but stops to see her. She is almost unrecognisable, so different than the person he saw what felt like just seconds ago. Her golden hair has iced to white, her skin shimmering as a silvery counterpart to his father’s former golden scales. She is all black leather, white skin and red lips, like a cruel mockery of her mother’s legend. She is sleek, beautiful, and terrifying. She is darkness personified.

“Mom?” Henry gasps, horrified, and she turns to look at her son with slow, catlike grace that sends a chill down Neal’s spine. “What happened to you?”

“You failed me,” she snarls. She is cold and cruel, deliberate, her gaze implicating every last one of them. Fiery rage Neal could have handled, but this is calculated, icy malice, and he’d never seen that from Emma. She’d always been like an inferno, like a hurricane, volatile but understandable, honest and raw. She’d never, ever been cool, slow and precise. “You all failed me.”

“Whatever we did…” Neal starts, and he almost falters when that frozen gaze turns on him. But he’s faced worse, and he promised he wouldn’t fail her, wouldn’t fear her, no matter what she did. “We’re sorry, Emma.”

“It’s a little late for that,” she replies, even and cold, not a trace of her old self left, not an inch. Her eyes are flat like a snake’s, and everything about her is sleek and impenetrable, like ice. The smirk on her face could kill a man at twenty paces, he’s sure of it.

One of the dwarves interrupts her, and Neal expects her to brush him off like a fly, irrelevant and disdainful at worst. Instead, to his horror, he watches as the women he loves more than anything in the world turns an innocent man to stone, and then brushes back out without another word. Murder is as easy and uneventful to her as breathing, and his worst nightmares come to life before his eyes.

For a moment, Neal is a boy, back on a peasant road, and his father is turning the old man from the butcher’s into a snail and crushing him to death for a minor accident. Neal’s heart slams in his chest, his breath catching in his throat, the memory striking like a stab to the heart.

Whatever happened in Camelot, it must have been terrible. They’ve lost her, he thinks, they’ve lost her, and the Gods only know if they can get her back before she brings the whole world crashing down around them.


	2. The Price

The yellow bug gleams in the streetlight, and for a moment nothing has changed.

Neal can’t remember the last time he was in Emma’s car, but he’s fairly certain it was back when it was their car, their home, with their belongings a jumble in the trunk and the whole world open before them. There’re a lot of things Neal can’t remember now, it seems, and he’s pretty sure that’s Emma’s fault. They only got back to Storybrooke an hour ago, and Henry’s already bundled up in bed at Regina’s, a thousand wards up to keep Emma out. But Neal couldn’t think of going back to his own bed, of sleeping at a time like this.

He went for a walk, and found the bug. The sunny yellow shade, such a perfect compliment to Emma’s golden curls and bright, flaming aura, now seems a mockery of the black-and-white nightmare she’s become.

“I could drive out of here,” he murmurs, stroking the bonnet. He speaks to her because she’s listening: she has to be listening. If she isn’t, well then he’s just a crazy guy muttering to himself, and that’s almost a family tradition at this point. “I could get in this car, hotwire it, grab Henry and sail off into the distance, no questions asked.”

He won’t, he wouldn’t, not now and not ever. He left his father alone with this curse, and he left Emma alone in this world, and he’s never going to repeat those mistakes again.

“You couldn’t,” her voice comes from behind him, but it doesn’t startle him. He’s lived with enough Dark Ones to know they never seem to walk anywhere. “You wouldn’t make it ten feet over the town line.”

“The town line?” Neal murmurs, almost smiling, almost too tired and miserable and panicked for this to feel real. He turns to her, and tries to see Emma behind the cold, shimmering scales and bleached hair, the red lips and black leather coat. Just as he once tried to find his father beneath the golden hide and opaque eyes, and begged him to return. “Isn’t that a bit repetitive?”

Emma smiles and gives a soft little chuckle, as stiff and cool as ever but a little self-deprecating, a little more herself than the icy anger she showed in the diner. She comes to lean next to him against the car, a posture so familiar it breaks his heart. This would be so much easier if it was just another monster, wearing her face, if it wasn’t really her. But it is, just as the last Dark One was still his father, in rags or in scales.

At least her movements are slow and fluid, controlled, rather than manic and jittery. He doesn’t think he could handle those hand gestures and twittering coming from her. “I prefer to think of it as a classic,” she says, and he tries to smile.

“I thought you were all rage and fury with us,” he said. “Didn’t think you’d actually show up.”

Emma shrugs, “I’m still rage and fury, I just figured it worth warning you. Especially if you were going to be stupid enough to take Henry with you.”

“Why?” Neal frowns, “What would happen to us?”

“You would… come to a sudden and permanent arboreal stop,” she grins, and Neal makes a mental note to ask Belle later what ‘arboreal’ means. Emma always had the advantage of having actually been to high school. The Neverland education department was lacking at best.

“That sounds unpleasant,” he grimaces, and Emma smiles.

“I would expect so, yes,” she replies.

“So warning delivered?” he asks, hating how his voice wavers, how even now, even cold and horrid as she is, he wants to beg her to stay. They were apart for so long, and there were so many things he never said to her. But then, perhaps he did say them, all of them, in Camelot. Perhaps she heard them and rejected him; perhaps he waited too long, and the darkness got to her first.

“Consider it a favour,” she replies, straightening and walking away. “Don’t expect another.”

“Whatever we did,” he calls after her, and she turns around with inhuman grace. “I’m sorry.”

“How can you apologise?” she laughs, mirthlessly. “You don’t know what you did.”

“I failed you,” he says. “The evidence is right here. We all screwed up and you paid the price. I’m sorry for that, and I’m not going to give up trying to save you.”

Emma gives an odd smile, and shakes her head. “Y’know what? When you know what’s coming, there’s irony everywhere,” she grins, and Neal feels a chill run down his spine at the malice in her tone. “There was nothing to save me from, Neal,” she adds. “This is just who I am now. You can’t save someone from their own soul.”

“Emma,” he shakes his head, “of all the people in this town to feed that bullshit to, you know I’m the last person who’ll believe it.”

She shrugs, “Your loss.” Then she vanishes, a swirl of charcoal smoke taking her far away, and Neal crumples against the car.

—

_Camelot – six weeks earlier_

“Okay,” Neal murmurs under his breath, “That’s one hell of a castle.”

Emma’s eyes widen at the sight of it, huge and intimidating and Medieval as any storybook every imagined it. “Yeah,” she replies. “That’s… pretty big.”

“Their bathrooms are probably the size of the hut I grew up in,” Neal notes. “But then, the bug’s bigger than the hut I grew up in.”

Emma snickers at that, and reaches out to take his hand. Neal feels himself warm all over at the contact, warm and sweetly meant, comforting. If nothing else, he’s eternally grateful that their friendship has returned: he missed his best friend in those intervening years easily as much as he missed anything else. He grips her hand back hard, and she smiles, grateful for the reassurance.

“How’d you find that get-up anyway?” he asks, as they cross the long drawbridge. “It’s very… peasant-witchy.”

“I kinda just came out in it,” Emma shrugs. “My hair was wet too.”

“Oh god, you didn’t get reformed out of that black gunk did you?” he grimaces. Emma smiles a little guiltily.

“Yeah, a little bit? It’s okay I think I’m clean now. The clothes kind of just came with the goo. I miss my jeans.”

“I miss your jeans too,” Neal sighs. “They’re much hotter than the baggy grey sack dress,” he winks at her, roguishly, and she smacks his arm with her free hand.

“I’m calling this my morally-confused swan dress,” she jokes. “Maybe if I’m good and don’t attempt to kill anymore Scottish princesses then it’ll turn white and I’ll be cured.”

“Oh god you saw that Barbie movie didn’t you?” Neal groans, as they come up to the guards at the front of the gate. “Well, good news is this place is full of knights. We’ll find someone to turn you back into a princess.”

Emma gives him a funny look at that; he doesn’t comment that if anyone were going to kiss her and turn her back, he’d like it to be him.

King Arthur welcomes them to Camelot. He’s imposing, a little vague on a lot of details, and Neal notices how no one tells him about Emma, about anyone’s true identity for that matter.

Then, without much preamble, the knights take their visitors to Merlin.

“That’s a tree,” Neal says, when they get to the courtyard. “Like, I know we’re from another world, but I can usually tell a powerful sorcerer apart from a tree, and that’s definitely a tree.”

Emma snickers, and Regina looks less than amused. Arthur doesn’t seem to get the joke – in the books he never seemed to have a sense of humour, as Neal recalls – and strides forward, kingly to the last. “Merlin is trapped inside the tree,” he explains.

“How do we get him out?” Regina demands, all action. Arthur turns to her.

“My lady, Merlin’s release is prophesised,” he promises, as if that means anything. Neal’s seen enough poorly interpreted prophesies to be a little sceptical that that is the reassurance it’s clearly intended to be. “The Saviour has come now, after all. Which one of you is that, by the way?”

Neal glances at Emma almost without thinking, and sees her making to step forward. Before she can, however, she seems to hit some sort of invisible wall. Neal stares at Regina, whose hand is moving with telltale slowness from her inner jacket pocket back to her side. A whispered command to be still and silent, and just like that Emma’s autonomy is stripped away. He’s never warmed to Henry’s second mother, especially not after all the stories he’s been told of her exploits, and it is with growing anxiety that he wonders exactly how similar Regina will prove to be to her wicked sister.

—

_Storybrooke_

Belle slept the night in the shop, so Neal comes by with coffee and a bear claw for her the next morning. He barely slept himself, too churned up by their sudden return and amnesia, and by his confrontation with Emma in the street. Belle looks clean and neat, despite apparently having slept on the couch opposite Rumpelstiltskin’s cot, but the bags under her eyes belie her worry.

She takes her breakfast with a smile of thanks, and they sit for a moment in silence, sipping their coffee and watching his father sleep. “I take it you tried True Love’s Kiss,” Neal sighs, after a moment. Belle looks at him oddly.

“I… no, not this time,” she replies, and he winces at the note of guilt in her voice, the uncertainty that wasn’t there the last time they banded together to save his father’s life.

“This time?” Neal frowns, “He’s been comatose before?”

“No, no, with the dark curse,” Belle shakes her head, her eyes firmly on her husband and not her stepson. “I… it worked the first time. I don’t know if anyone ever told you that, but it did. The first time we kissed, the power of our love almost destroyed this curse.”

“Then why didn’t it succeed?” Neal asks, confused. “He was still the Dark One when he found me.”

“He got scared,” Belle explains, regretful and sad and a little resigned, the tone of a woman used to telling herself the same sad tale. “He couldn’t live without his powers, so he clawed them back. And in that moment, the darkness regained its hold on him forever.”

“So you think it can’t work now?” Neal asks. “You think that true love’s kiss is a one-time deal?”

“I think that a curse isn’t a curse if the inflicted wants it,” Belle tells him. “And I think he wanted the power it brought more than he wanted me. He chose power over love, over our love. And I don’t think you get a second chance to make that choice.”

“The power to find me,” Neal corrects, softly. Belle finally turns to look at him. She looks small, tight and defensive, her coffee cradled in her hands on her knees, her shoulders hunched.

“What?”

“You said he chose power over love,” Neal reminds her. “But without his power, his centuries of searching for me would have come to nothing. He’d never have been able to make the curse or have Regina cast it, and I’d probably be living in New York somewhere, blissfully unaware of any of this. We’d never have seen each other again.”

“That’s a nice idea,” Belle agrees, “But… he found you. And he still chose the darkness over his family. You were there, you saw it!”

“And that’s why you won’t try true love’s kiss,” Neal realises, with sinking finality. “Because you’re not sure that yours is true love anymore.”

It’s been a long time since Bae has felt any compunction for protectiveness over his father, and when it comes its a very strange feeling to have. But sat there, his stepmother making her excuses and his father comatose and close to death, Neal realises for the first time in centuries that he’s firmly and unquestioningly on Rumpelstiltskin’s side in this. He just desperately hopes that Belle doesn’t intend sides to be drawn at all.

“It was, once,” Belle admits, after a long and awkward pause. “I do… Bae, I do love him. I love him more than I want to, more than I should. But it wasn’t enough before, and I can’t make myself believe it could be now.”

“Then we have to find another way to wake him up,” Neal decides, without looking her in the eye. Action now: unwanted emotional compromises later. “Maybe we did, in Camelot, not that we’d know now. That is… assuming you’re not just waiting for him to die?”

“Bae!” Belle scolds, horrified. “Gods, is that what you think of me?”

“I don’t know what to think,” he sighs, sinking into himself, defeated and burying his face in his hands. “I’m so tired, and Emma’s off… I don’t know what she’s off doing, and papa’s half dead, and I don’t know what to think.”

“I want him to wake up, Bae,” Belle assures him, one soothing hand rubbing his back. “And I want Emma safe and restored to herself. I don’t want this curse to hurt anyone ever again. But… you should know, better than anyone, that it’s far easier to hate a Dark One than it is to love one.”

“I also know that it’s a mistake to use that as an excuse,” Neal replies, his voice muffled in his hands. He rubs them together, palm to palm as he raises his head, as if he’s praying, as if there’re any Gods left he can believe in anymore. “That there’s a difference between the person they were and who they are as the Dark One, and that the former can’t always be blamed for the latter. I know it’s tempting to draw things in black and white but… I learned that the hard way. I just, well, I guess I’d hoped you had too.”

He rises to his feet; Belle doesn’t follow. “Bae-“ she stops him, as he starts to walk away. He turns back to face her. “I’m sorry,” she says. “I’m sorry about Emma, and I’m sorry that this is so hard. I’m sorry you lost them both to this.”

“I haven’t lost anyone yet.” Neal grits his teeth, and gestures to the sleeping body on the cot, “He’s not dead yet, not by a long way, and Emma’s out there just waiting to be saved. I haven’t lost either of them.”

He leaves without another word, Belle doesn’t call him back again.

—

_Camelot_

“She gave you the dagger.”

Neal can see Regina is surprised to see him, lingering in the corridor outside her room, and she jumps a little at the sound of his voice. “Yes,” she says, smoothly, covering her shock as she walks toward him, “She did. Do I detect a note of jealousy?”

“Regina, if she’d given it to me I’d have buried it in the woods somewhere so it could never be used. I don’t want to own that dagger any more than I want it buried in my chest.”

“Then why the sullen tone?” Regina smirks, and Neal wonders how no one has ever punched her in the face.

“I don’t care who has it,” Neal explains, “but I care who  _uses_  it. In that I care that  _no one_  ever uses it. As the only person in this castle aside from Emma who’s felt its compulsion before, I need to ask you never to do it again.”

“Emma can’t think straight,” Regina argues. “She’s cursed, and you of all people know how that changes someone. She can’t make good choices like this. I am trying to help her.”

“So it’s your place to choose for her?” Neal raises an eyebrow, more infuriated by the second. “And to enforce that choice, if needs be?”

“She gave me the dagger for this very reason,” Regina snarls. “Because she knew I would do what needs to be done. Because she knew that no one else has the stomach for it.”

“She meant for you to use it in emergencies,” Neal snaps back. “And you know it. You know, people always talk about how the curse corrupts people, but it has two ends: the person controlled by the knife, and the person doing the controlling. Both sides get corrupted by it.”

“Oh, so you’re looking out for  _my_  soul here?” Regina snickers, “That’s very sweet, Stiltskin-junior, and a little ironic if you think of it. I mean, considering your lineage.”

“I’m looking out for Emma,” Neal stipulates. “Honestly, I couldn’t care less what happens to you, after what you did to my kid for a decade. Emma sees something good in you so I’ll go with that. I’ll buy you’re reformed and kind and good now. But that doesn’t mean I trust _anyone_  with the power to control her. Your own sister is a testament to how badly things can go wrong.”

“Oh come on,” Regina scoffs, “I’m not going to keep her in a cage or make her kill anyone. Quite the opposite: I’m trying to limit the damage she can do as much as possible.”

“Yeah, because good intentions, they always work out how you want them to.”

“So speaks the voice of experience?” Regina’s eyebrows raise, “What happened the last time you decided to look out for Emma’s wellbeing? Oh, that’s right, you abandoned her, pregnant, in prison, for a decade. But no, go on, I’d love to hear another lecture on responsible magic usage from the rejected deadbeat ex-boyfriend.”

She breezes past him, down the hallway. Neal seethes, but takes a deep breath, and releases it slowly, before returning to his own rooms.

—

_Storybrooke_

Neal is halfway to Snow and Charming’s apartment, when the person he’s looking for catches up to him. “Hey, dad.”

Neal stops and turns, catching Henry up in a hug before Henry has time to say anything else. Henry makes a small noise of protest, “So you heard, huh?”

“You summoned your mom?” Neal checks, letting his son step back at last. “Yeah, I heard. I was on my way to find you, actually. How are you?”

“I’m… I’m okay,” Henry raises his chin, brave and resolute boy he is, and in that moment Neal loves him more than he can express. “We have to save her, dad,” he says, “before she hurts anyone for real.”

“Did she say what this thing on its way is?” Neal asks. “Did she give any details?”

“No, she just said only a Saviour can stop it, and told my other mom she wasn’t it. She seems pretty certain this curse is built to last.”

“No curse is unbreakable, you should know that,” Neal reminds him, and Henry smiles and nods.

“Yeah, Regina said that too. Emma didn’t seem as certain.”

“We’ll be better off once we can wake your grandpa up,” Neal says. “I… could you do me a favour, Henry?”

“Of course, dad, anything.”

“Go to the shop and help Belle out,” Neal requests. “I don’t think Emma will come near the old Dark One, and there’ll be more clues to stopping this in that dusty old shop than in the rest of town combined.”

“You want me to do research?”

“It’s a family tradition,” Neal grins. “Your mom’s side are all action heroes, but you take after me. Knowledge is power, after all.”

“You’re going to find my mom, aren’t you?” Henry’s eyes narrow. “And you want me out of the way when you do.”

His son is too smart for his own good, Neal thinks with a helpless grin. For all it’s annoying to be outsmarted by his own kid, he’s never been anything less than proud and delighted with Henry’s crafty intelligence. It’s one of the few things Neal can really see of himself in the boy, and he treasures it.

“You’re welcome to stick around if you want to,” Neal holds up his hands. “I just remember how much it sucks to watch your parents fight.”

“You want me to go help Belle wake up grandpa?” Henry checks, with an acquiescent sigh, and Neal nods.

“And keep her company. She loves you a lot, you know, like the rest of us. She’ll be glad to have you around.”

Henry does the unexpected then: he reaches out and throws his arms around his father, and Neal hugs him close, comforted beyond belief to have his son close, to feel him safe and warm and strong in his arms. Neal had never understood how his father could have done such terrible things in his name until he’d gotten to know Henry. Now, tearing the world apart seems a small price to keep his son safe.

“Tell mom I love her,” Henry asks, then, and it breaks Neal’s heart. “I don’t think I told her earlier. No matter how scary or awful she is, I love her.”

“She knows that,” Neal soothes, pulling away and smoothing Henry’s hair, “She knows how much you love her. She loves you too.”

“I know she does,” Henry nods. “I know that.”

“Good, don’t ever forget it.” Henry nods again, and with a last look at his dad, he turns and walks away, toward Mr Gold’s shop.

Neal waits until he’s out of sight, and then takes a slow breath out. “You’re watching him, all the time, so I’m not going to summon you. If you want to talk, I’m here.”

“You always say that,” Emma’s voice comes from behind him, and when he turns to see her he’s surprised to see her no longer wrapped in her long black coat. Instead she wears a tight black dress that Regina could have chosen, sleeveless with her arms bare and pale, almost shimmering in the light of day, and her hair as bleached white as it was last night. She swaggers with a kind of smug, cruel confidence he’s never seen on her before, and it’s unsettling as when his quiet, mild-mannered father had suddenly become a twittering showman.

“It’s always true,” Neal replies, stiffly. She stands too close, predatory and uncompromising, and he resists the urge to step back. “If you want to talk, that is.”

“I prefer to show, rather than tell,” she teases, and suddenly she’s grabbed him by the shoulders, and they’re whisked away by magic. When the charcoal smoke clears, they’re outside a house as grand and imposing as his father’s salmon-pink palace. Emma’s new home is slate-grey as her magic, and as cold and forbidding as her new appearance. “What do you think?”

“I’m guessing this is home now?” he looks around, and tries to imagine the girl he knew ever feeling comfortable in such a place. He can’t.

“Cursing a whole town comes with some perks,” she grins, and leads him up the stairs. He follows out of grim curiosity more than anything.

The inside is decorated as sparsely as the outside, every inch reflecting Emma’s new Spartan style. Everything is cool, bleached wood or black, nothing like the opulence of Regina’s office or the warm, dark clutter of the pawnshop. But then, Emma had always been able to fit her entire life in the back of the yellow bug. Neal supposes it’s not so much of a stretch to think that as the Dark One she’d be drawn to simplicity.

“What do you think?” she asks, with a smile, and he tries to smile back.

“It’s… ah… well it seems… clean?” he manages, and she laughs at him.

“What, do you miss the luxury of that tiny apartment back in New York?” she asks, a little coyly. “Or can I just not match the glamor of a Granny’s hotel room?”

“It’s a little bleak,” he admits. “Not really your style, I guess.”

“Bleak is a prison cell,” she shoots back, instantly, and he winces. The smile is back on her face when she sees him recoil, and he tries not to shudder at how happy she is to have hit him where he still hurts. “Anything else is a step up, and this is the very best.”

“It’s not Tallahassee,” he murmurs. She glares at him, sharp and unforgiving.

“See that’s the thing,” she snarls, “some people grow and adapt, others are left clinging to old relics.”

“The Emma I knew valued those  _relics_. The real Emma, the Emma who never forgot the people who’d loved her. She knew good memories are sometimes all we have.”

“The people who loved me betrayed me,” she snaps, and it’s his turn to glare.

“You need to stop making these vague accusations, when you’ve made it so none of us can remember what you’re accusing us of!” he cries. “How can we keep apologising when you’ve stopped us from knowing what we did wrong?”

She bristles, and he braces himself for her anger. But then her shoulders slump, the fight seeming to drain from her, as if she has no rebuttal left in her. It’s almost believable, but Neal catches the little smirk to her lips, the gleam in her eyes. “Come on, Neal,” she sighs, soft and low, as if begging for an armistice, for peace. She leans in, as if drawn by some undeniable attraction, her hands flat on his chest, stroking his jacket. “I didn’t want to fight today. I didn’t bring you here for an argument.”

“Then why am I here, Emma?” he asks, warily, and she smiles, her eyes on his chest, her smile slow and almost wistful.

“I have this whole house,” she murmurs, “and I keep remembering the old days. How we’d plan our lives together, what we’d buy, how we’d decorate, how we’d live.” She finally looks up at him, and for a moment, the briefest moment, he thinks he can see her behind those steely eyes. “We’ve been apart too long, Neal,” she breathes. “I’ve always wanted you, and I was too blinded by hurt to really know what that meant. I have clarity now… I  _want_  you now.”

Neal will always be amazed by how the Dark One can say all the right things, and yet mean all the wrong ones. He looks down at her, her face so close to his, the face he’s loved so deeply for over a decade, the mother of his child, the only woman he will ever love. He looks down at her, and wonders if that love can be enough, if maybe Belle was wrong, and despite Emma’s apparent acceptance of the curse, true love’s kiss could still break the spell.

He leans in, closer, and for the first time in a lifetime to his recollection, they kiss. Her lips are as soft and yielding as ever they’ve been, and for a moment he’s lost in wonder, in the raw magic of kissing the woman he loves so very, very much. It’s a new and heady rush and yet it’s utterly familiar, and for just that second, everything is as it should be.

But then she cranes forward, all desperation, and tries to deepen it, her hands like claws against his lapels. He pulls back.

Neal opens his eyes, and disappointment sinks in his stomach like deadweight. Emma is still cold and sharp, all diamond skin, cruel eyes and red lips, and nothing has changed. Belle was right, after all: Emma’s curse can’t be lifted if she’s enjoying her affliction.

“What’s wrong?” she asks, all hurt and confusion, but there’s a mean smile pulling at the corners of her mouth. “Not so eager now?”

“I’d kinda hoped…”

“True love’s kiss,” she steps back, away from him, her hands dropping. “You talked to Belle.”

“She was right,” Neal says, bitterly. “I… Gods, I hoped she was wrong. I hoped she was so angry at my dad and so desperate not to feel guilty that she’d made it up, but I was stupid, and she was right.”

“Why are you trying to save me, Neal?” Emma demands. “This is who I am now, why can’t you just accept that?”

“This isn’t who you are,” Neal counters. “You know that, and I know that, and you know that of everyone in this town I’m the last person who’ll ever believe anything else. Don’t try that line on me, Emma!”

“Does it matter how I got this way?” she yells back. “People go dark, it doesn’t matter if it’s a curse or a dead boyfriend or a spell cast on you before you’re even born, okay? And by the way, all of those have happened to me, I have  _every right_  to be this way. Darkness exists as much as light does, and you’re an idiot if you think there’s good and bad versions of everyone.”

“My dad didn’t go dark because the world was a shitty place to him,” Neal replies, his voice low and cold, angrier than he’s been in a long time. “My dad stayed good through all of that, as a matter of fact. My dad went dark because he stabbed a demon and killed a bunch of soldiers to protect me, because he wanted the power to stop terrible men from killing children. He went into the woods a person, and he came out a monster. Just like you went to Camelot my best friend, and came back like this.”

“ _Best friend_ ,” she mimics, rolling her eyes. “God, is that what you tell yourself to get to sleep at night?”

“It’s what we are, Emma,” he replies. “Whether you like it or not. And no matter what emotional crap we go through or how many monsters we fight, or how many times we might fall in love and fall apart, that doesn’t change. You say I should accept you’re just  _dark_  now? You need to accept I’m going to love you anyway. The real you, not the… black leather and murder you.”

“Come on,” she smirks, her gaze softening to bedroom eyes, “Admit it, you like the black leather.”

“I liked the red jacket better.”

“It’s not coming back,” she shrugs, with a nonchalance that shatters his heart. “But you’re welcome to stay, if you want. I’m sure we can find lots of ways to have more fun than fighting. Or y’know, have fun  _while_  fighting.”

Neal steps back, shaking his head, trying to penetrate through the wall of glass between them and make her hear him. “Emma, I’ve loved you for over a decade. I’d have been happy to wait forever for you to love me the same way again, I’ll spend my whole life trying to make up for what I did to you. I deserve nothing from you, I know that. But I love  _you_ , the real you, not this creepy messed-up Dark One version of you. And I don’t want this to be how it happens.”

“You don’t want me,” she interprets, icily. “You can’t love me like this. You spent the last months so angry with Belle for not accepting your dad’s darkness, and yet you can say the exact same to me now.”

“I was angry that she gave up on him, but despite it all she came back, in the end. I’m not giving up on you, not ever, not for a second. But if being with you like this means accepting that this change is permanent, then I can’t do it.”

“Fine,” she bites out, and then turns and walks away into the house, the conversation clearly over.

Neal leaves her home without another word, slamming the door behind him.

—

_Camelot_

Neal wonders who’s idea it was to dress Emma all in white, if only because whomever it was is clearly a visionary. For all that she was stunning in the red satin ball gown they’d waltzed in in their jaunt to the past, she’s utterly radiant in white muslin, with a pale wreath of flowers around her head, and her golden curls tumbling over her shoulders.

He can’t take his eyes off her as she descends the staircase, and she blushes under his gaze. Neal finds his heart beating faster when, instead of going to her father as he’d expected, she walks directly to him. “You look…” he starts, and she almost blushes, her eyes cast down demurely.

“Better than jeans and a jacket, then?” she asks, and he grins.

“I love the red jacket,” he promises, “but you look like a princess. It… it suits you.”

“Technically I  _am_  a princess,” she winks at him, and he laughs with her. “And you don’t look so bad yourself. Not bad for a penniless thief.”

He looks down at his dark brown leather doublet and pants, forced on him by Charming with the advice that he needed to look the part, and grimaces. “A little different from the old days, yeah. This is not who I was way back when.”

“I missed this look,” she muses. “The leather suits you.”

“Graham, Hook, and now me?” he raises his eyebrows. “The leather’s a real thing for you, isn’t it?”

He’s trying to joke, but when her eyes glaze over he realises he’s pushed it too far. Hook is still such a recent trauma for her, such a deep wound, and he hadn’t meant to make light of it.

“Yeah,” she murmurs, and out of habit he takes her hand and draws her in. He’s thankful when she relaxes against him, and lets him wrap an arm around her waist.

“I’m sorry,” he replies. “I didn’t mean to… I was just kidding around.”

“No, no, I know,” she smiles, like a benediction, and he hopes against hope that the curse won’t take her smile away. When Emma smiles it’s like the sun coming out, and he lives for the warmth. She sighs and squares her shoulders, as if physically shaking off the sudden melancholy. “Do you wanna dance? I think I can still remember from before.”

“I’d love to,” he grins, and takes her hands in his, leading her in the only waltz either of them can perform without breaking toes.

They dance for minutes or hours, and Neal feels time all but stop with her in his arms. No matter what happens next, he can’t imagine not loving this woman: this woman who is so beautiful and stoic, and yet laughs like a child when the right words are said; this woman who can dance like an angel and yet spends half the time they spend dancing also making sly commentary about the other dancers. Neal feels himself almost flying with the low, sweet sound of her voice, and the feel of her slender body warm in his arms, and the scent of her hair and perfume and those damned flowers on her head.

“Is that Henry?” Emma asks, after they’ve danced for a while, and Neal’s eyes shift from their happy admiration of her face to where she’s looking. It is their son, stood over in a corner with a pretty girl of about his own age. An iPod headphone chord runs between them.

“Damn, it is!” Neal laughs, surprised and happy and proud all at once. “That’s my boy, picking up the hottest princess at the ball.”

“Hottest princess, huh?” Emma raises an eyebrow at him, and there’s an old, familiar note of suggestion in her eyes, that he hasn’t seen in a long, long time. “So what’re you doing dancing with me, then?”

“Okay, now you’re just fishing for compliments,” he teases, and she grins up at him, unrepentant.

“I’m just checking you’ve not spent the night eyeing up some Arthurian lady,” she flirts back. “You’ve been dancing with me, after all, and even as the Dark One I have an ego.”

“Fine,” he rolls his eyes dramatically, and she giggles. “ _Even_  as the Dark One, you’re the most beautiful woman in all the realms,” he tells her, and she blushes despite having gone looking for the compliment.

“There’re those courtly manners,” she murmurs, trying to brush it off and failing. Their eyes meet, and their feet slow to a stop, and for a moment everything is very warm and very still, as if the whole world around them is holding its breath. Neal wonders if now, after everything, after all of his caution and discretion, now is when they’ll find their way back to one another.

But then her eyes flicker, she glances at Henry, and an old and unforgotten sadness creeps into her eyes. He knows she felt it too, the electricity and the warmth beneath it, the love that always has been and always will bind them together. And he knows, as always, that she was then reminded of all the things he’s done to hurt her, and all the men she’s lost before him, and she pulled away.

“Except your mom, of course,” he jokes at last, as if nothing had happened. “She’s looking damn fine tonight.”

Emma laughs, shocked and open-mouthed, and stamps on his toe. “You’re kind of an asshole, you know that? Plus she’s taken…. and she’s my  _mom_. So she’s your kid’s grandma. Which’d be gross.”

“Ugh, and you never let me forget it,” he rolls his eyes sarcastically, and she laughs and the air lightens, and the dance continues.

—

_Storybrooke_

It’s late in the day when Neal returns to the shop, once again bearing food. He’s picked up a burger and fries, a peace offering to Belle after their argument earlier. He has enough pain and conflict in his life already, and so does she: they need each other, even if they don’t always agree on everything.

But when he enters the shop, he can hear Regina in the back. Belle’s eyes fly to his, and he holds up the Granny’s bag silently, his eyebrows raised in question.

Belle nods, gratefully, but then presses a finger to her lips.

“You made me this way!” Regina yells in the back. Neal is taken aback: can she really be screaming at his comatose father?

He keeps quiet, but draws closer, listening closely as Regina continues to lambast a man who can’t hear a word she says. He sets the bag down on the counter, and Belle gives him another grateful smile.

He reaches for the legal pad out on the side, and scribbles a note, ‘Anything new?’

Belle nods, and scribbles a note of her own. ‘Henry found something - a Fury? A Price?’

She shows him a page with a terrifying drawing on it, a ghost-like figure howling.

‘All magic comes with a price’, Neal writes back, as Regina finally falls silent. ‘You gonna tell her?’

Belle nods, and sighs, getting her head together. Neal doesn’t know how Belle has the strength to continue to even tolerate Regina’s existence after all the other woman has put her through, but Neal can appreciate how hard she must work at it. It clearly isn’t easy for her, not that he expects Regina would ever notice that.

He watches as Belle walks through to the back room, and tells Regina she’s found something. Neal leaves the food on the counter, and scribbles one last note before leaving them to it. He knows he can’t contribute to the discussion, and he’s honestly too overwhelmed to feel capable of helping out, much less explaining to Regina yet again that all magic comes at a price. He wonders how often his father tried to hammer that lesson home, to no avail. Neal has never felt comfortable with how easily Regina throws fireballs around, and he can’t imagine she’ll take this news any better than the last.

‘Good luck – call if you need x’

—

_Camelot_

“You can’t make her do this,” Neal snaps, unbending even in the face of Regina’s pleading eyes.

Robin is all but dead on the table, and Neal, although he hardly knows the guy, understands the bind Regina’s in. He doesn’t know what terrifying lengths he’d go to in order to save Emma if someone stabbed her, although the situation is somewhat different now. Emma’s hands are shaking, her eyes wide and terrified, full of tears. He wonders if she’s scared of her magic, or of Regina’s hand straying toward the dagger.

Neal draws her into his arms and holds her close, trying to soothe her and protect her all at once. Regina begs, “Please, Emma. I won’t force you, I wouldn’t, but please. He’s all I have. He’s my true love,  _please_.”

Emma sees the pain in Regina’s eyes, and not for the first time Neal curses her endlessly generous nature. She pulls out of his arms, and nods. “I will.”

But then her eyes stray, across the room, and rest on an empty chair in the corner. She walks toward it, her head tilted as if listening closely, and he hears her mutter, “Then I’ll pay it.”

“There’s a price,” he calls over to her, “isn’t there?”

Emma rounds on him, her hands shaking. Neal knows then that whomever she’d seen in that chair, it was the same dark force who’d once sat in his mother’s empty seat before the fire, and talked his father into terrible, bloody deeds. His hands shake, but he clenches them behind his back: no one needs to see his troubles, with so much else at stake. “I can do this,” Emma asserts, striding back toward Robin. Neal gets in the way, and holds her wrists in his, trying to hold her back.

“You know there’s a price, Emma,” he reminds her, softly. “And I know whatever it is that’s talking in your head, it won’t have told you what it is.”

“Robin’s dying, Neal,” she pleads. “I have to save him.”

“Just think of what might come next,” he argues back. “Just… think for a moment.”

“She’s made her choice,” Regina interrupts. “And she’s going to help me. You know she is.”

“I am,” she agrees. “I have to. Whatever the price is, I can handle it.”

Reluctantly, Neal releases her wrists, and Emma returns to Robin’s side. He can’t watch as she performs dark magic to save his life: the sight is too reminiscent of something else. He doesn’t tell her, then, that of course dark magic can do good: it allowed his father to lead all the children home, and end a war. They never said what the price would be. He’s always wondered how his father ended up paying, for all his suspicions.

Robin sputters back to life, and Neal watches as Emma recoils from his body, her whole frame buckling as Neal steps forward and bundles her into his arms. All of a sudden, out of nowhere, her lips are on his, and she’s kissing him passionately, endlessly, as if their last kiss wasn’t twelve years and a whole world away. He kisses her back, unable to help himself, clutching her close and drowning in the familiar taste of her mouth, in the love and the affection he’s yearned for ever since they first parted.

It ends as soon as it started, and he sighs in resignation when he sees the stunned, unhappy look on her face. She isn’t ready to talk about it, apparently, and he smiles easily, like it happens all the time, and forgives her for her coming silence without a word. She smiles back, her gratitude breaking his heart. He doesn’t consider how nothing has changed, how that kiss doesn’t seem to have broken the curse. He doesn’t muse on True Love, because his mind is too busy worrying about prices paid for lives restored.

—

_Storybrooke_

“Okay, so I figured it out,” he says, apropros of nothing, when Belle takes a seat beside him at the bar, and Granny sets two more beers before them without a word.

“Figured what out?” she asks, frowning, and he turns to look at her with a sad smile.

“The price,” he explains. “I figured it out. Because Regina had to give a life to save Robin’s so… I guess everyone who helped with that has given up part of their life or something?”

Belle shrugs, “I asked her, but she doesn’t know. Hopefully it won’t matter too much.”

“Let’s hope,” Neal murmurs, “Charming will freak out if he goes prematurely bald.”

Belle manages a laugh at that, and they clink their glasses in cheers before taking a long drink. “So which price have you figured out then?” she asks after a moment.

“My dad’s,” he says, and watches her frown deepen. “When… when he first became Dark One, he did it not just to save me, but all the children who got sent to the ogre war. He used magic to save them and bring them home. I think I worked out how he paid for that.”

Belle thinks for a moment, and then her face creases with sadness and shock, and he knows she’s figured it out. “You,” she gasps. “He paid when he lost you.”

Neal nods, “That’s what I figure: find a hundred kids, lose the only kid you really care about. Dark One magic is all about equivalent exchange.”

“I’m sorry,” Belle murmurs, and Neal tries to smile at her.

“It’s okay, it was a long time ago.”

“Did you find Emma?” she asks, then, and he winces.

“I did,” he admits. “It… yeah, I’m sorry about earlier. You were right, I guess. I shouldn’t have… it’s easier being his kid, in a way. At least I’m allowed to hate him while still loving him deep down inside. And he was always willing to try for me, even if he couldn’t succeed. He chose power over me once, but it’s hard to keep feeling rejected when someone tears a whole universe apart to fix one mistake. I didn’t realise how difficult it is to really, truly love a Dark One, and have it mean  _nothing_.”

“It’s the worst feeling in the world,” Belle sighs, and scoots closer, resting her head on his shoulder and an arm around his back. “I’m sorry you have to know how that feels. But…” she takes a deep breath, and looks up into his face. “We won’t give up. Either of us. You inspired me today, Bae. We won’t abandon them again, will we?”

“No,” he smiles genuinely at that, and hugs her close. “We won’t.”


	3. Interlude (1)

Every day that Rumpelstiltskin remains comatose, another petal falls from Belle’s enchanted rose. Neal worries, day and night, that she’ll call him out of nowhere and tell him the last one had fallen, that he’s too late, that the last his father will know of him was him giving up and walking away.

_“Papa, you can’t do this. Innocent people are going to suffer. It’s not too late, you can still turn back.”  
_

_“I have to, Bae. There’s no other way. Please, let me explain-”  
_

_“There isn’t an explanation for this, papa! If you could even think that anything was worth this, this… evil, then there’s truly no saving you.”_

Neal had turned on his heel and left the diner, left his father to his evil magic and his Author. He’d gone to find Emma, to warn her, to work out a new plan. The next time he’d seen his father, he was unconscious on the shop floor, his life force draining out, the truth finally revealed and Neal’s conscience burdened with guilt.

“I didn’t mean it, papa,” Neal murmurs, sitting by the cot, his eyes fixed on his father’s sleeping face. “I should have let you explain.” 


	4. Siege Perilous

“Hey, Neal?” Belle looks up from her book to her stepson, who’s sprawled in a chair on the other side of the back room. They’ve been researching a healing spell for his father for the past few hours, the past few days in fact. The rose is down to only a few final petals, and it breaks Neal’s heart every time he looks at it.

“Yeah?” he replied, dredging himself from the intensely boring mysteries of wormwood application to look back at her.

“It’s your turn to fetch lunch,” she reminds him. Neal nods, and rises to his feet with a mock grimace, drawing a small laugh from Belle. In all honesty, he doesn’t mind being the one to do the lunch run. Belle will eat ridiculously tiny portions if she’s allowed – something Bae attributes to anxiety, due to the phenomenal amounts of food that tiny woman can somehow devour if his father is the one cooking. And anyway, she has terrible taste in bagels.

“I’m getting you real food,” he warns her, stabbing a finger in her direction. She sticks out her tongue, but understands his meanings: there will be no undressed salads, no tiny bowls of meek mushroom broth, and no carrot sticks passing themselves off as French fries on his watch. Belle will eat a hamburger or he will die trying to convince her.

Granny’s is only over the road. For a moment, Neal marvels at how the diner is once again open, clean, stable and functional after having been hurled over two worlds only a few days ago. Then he remembers that both Regina and the Blue Fairy are loyal customers, and rubs his hand over his face in exasperation with himself: he so easily forgets, still, that this land now has magic. 

He and Emma all but lived in cheap, slightly tacky diners when they were on the road. To think of this place, a carbon copy of every other diner in America, as being stocked with sorcerers and magical creatures still throws him a little.

Robin Hood is sat at the counter when he arrives, as a case in point. He’s looking at something on his phone with great interest, and Neal remembers with an uncomfortable rush Zelena’s pregnancy. Robin is Zelena’s other victim, perhaps the only man in town who has suffered as deeply at her hands as Neal and his father. It is with sympathy that Neal takes his seat beside the other man.

“You’re gonna burn a hole in that thing if you don’t look away soon,” Neal comments, and Robin sighs, and nods.

“I know, I’m sorry,” he shakes his head and pinches the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger. “I just… they took a picture inside Zelena today, if you can believe such a thing.”

Neal cranes over, and sure enough, Robin’s embryo stares back. “Uh, man, that’s called an ultrasound,” Neal corrects him, gently. “You need to lead with ‘ultrasound’ or people’re going to think you have a fetish.”

“I’ll take your word for it, friend,” Robin shrugs, and goes back to contemplating the baby. “I… I think he might look like me.”

“Huh,” Neal frowns, and looks closer, “Maybe. It’s not green so that’s a start.”

Robin laughs at that, “Yes, that would be unfortunate.”

“How’re you… coping with that?”  Neal asks, trying to be delicate. “The whole Zelena mess? I don’t know how you manage to exist in the same room with her.”

“I… I don’t think we know each other well enough for this conversation,” Robin shakes his head, pulling away. But Neal, feeling the kinship of mutual survivors, presses a little harder.

“I know, and it’s awkward that my dad tried to flay you alive or something… but my stepmom saved you so that’s something, right?”

“Ah yes, Belle,” Robin nods, relaxing a little at the evocation of her name. “How is she doing, these days? I’ve been so wrapped up… Regina and Zelena and the baby. Is she coping?”

“She’s… Belle,” Neal smiles, fondly, “She’s trying to read her way out of it. She’s not going to give up, she’s tough as nails that one.”

“Well tell her hello from me,” Robin says. “I’ll try to stop by sometime, maybe… maybe even after your father wakes up. I know he was a monster, some of the time, but truthfully? I think Belle was right. I saw him in New York, after his banishment, and I have to say he wasn’t… he wasn’t a bad person, somehow. I hope he survives this.”

“I think she’d like to see you,” Neal agrees. “Especially if you tell her that. She needs support, right now. And on that topic, support and all, I need to tell you… I’m really sorry for what happened to you, and to your wife. I only knew her a few hours but she was a really great woman, and if we’d paid more attention… maybe she’d still be alive. And maybe you wouldn’t be facing this situation right now.”

“Marion… Marion was special,” Robin smiles, sadly, fondly. “I loved her so much, but it was young love: the simple love of a young man with straightforward ideals. I miss being that man, and I miss being the man who loved her. But in the end… Marion was ever my past. Regina’s my future. Regina and…”

“And the baby of your wife’s murderer, who violated your trust and your physical safety for the sake of revenge,” Neal finishes. Robin winces.

“Yes, her,” he agrees. “You know… I can’t be in a room with her, anymore. Regina took her to get the ultrasound, and texted me this picture after. Just being in a room with that witch makes my skin crawl. I am quite shamefully afraid of her, although I’d never let Regina know that.”

“Hey, you’re talking to the man she had locked in a cage for over a year through mental and physical torture,” Neal shrugs. “I understand not being able to be around her. And being afraid of her… she’s capable of anything, all kinds of sick, twisted cruelty. Anyone with sense’d be afraid of someone like that: I understand completely.”

“Thank you, Neal,” Robin smiles, sadly but genuinely, and Neal nods.

“Anytime you need to talk, man, I’m always around.” He and Robin shake hands, the closest men get to giving a hug, Neal supposes, but they’re interrupted by Granny.

“Hey, Neal!” Granny calls, “Order’s up.”

“I didn’t… order yet,” Neal frowns, and Granny shakes her head.

“It’s under Emma’s name, she said to give it to you.”

“Shit,” Neal mutters under his breath, and reads the note on the brown bag Granny hands him.

Meet me where we met, I need to talk to you

-Emma

“Cryptic,” Robin mutters, when he’s seen the message too. “And didn’t the two of you meet far from Storybrooke?”

“We met in Portland, Oregon,” Neal’s forehead crumples in confusion, and then clears. “In the yellow bug,” he realises, all becoming clear. “Clever.” He turns to Robin, trying not to panic about seeing Emma again, and in such an important place. “Could you maybe do me a favour?”

“Anything you need, my friend.”

Neal rummages for cash in his back pocket, and pulls out a twenty-dollar bill. “Could you maybe get Belle a hamburger and fries and take it around to her? Granny knows how she likes it. Get something for yourself too, if you like: she eats better with company.”

“For Belle I’m sure I can manage that,” Robin agrees. Neal nods and smiles, thankful that Belle won’t be left all alone, before leaving the diner.

The walk to the yellow bug, parked just off Main, isn’t far, but Neal dawdles. He has no idea what Emma’s playing at, buying them food and referring to their first day together, but it’s making him uneasy. After their last meeting, the thought of seeing her again makes his palms sweat: just seeing her like this, so changed, so fully consumed by the curse that tore his father from him all those years ago, is like a stab wound to the gut.

He reaches the bug at last, and sets the food on top of the bonnet. 

“Hey, stranger,” Emma’s voice comes from behind him, but he doesn’t jump. He turns, slow and controlled, trying to hide his rapid heartbeat. She’s the same as before: black leather coat that she could have stolen straight from his father’s old wardrobe, high collar and all, bleached white hair and poisonous red lips.

“You know we’re grownups now,” he says. “We can eat where there’s a table and stuff.”

“Yeah, I know,” Emma nods, “but I miss the bug, just like I miss you. I miss us, and what’s a better symbol of us than our old home?”

“You asked me here for nostalgia?” Neal frowns, “I mean fair enough, being homeless runaways was a blast, but it seems an odd time.”

“Well, I wanted to apologise,” she admits, although there’s no guilt in her eyes, for all they’re beseeching. “I… I was mean before, cruel. I pushed too hard. We need to talk, not to fight. We won’t work any of this out through screaming at each other.”

“I want to work this out,” he promises. “I… for all I want you to be free of this, I also don’t want to lose you.”

“I’m glad,” she nods, and he turns to fetch the food. “I missed you, Neal.” When he looks back at her, he almost jumps out of his skin: gone is the stone-white hair, the frightening black leather garb.  Suddenly she could be eighteen again, her hair back in a ponytail, those ridiculous black horn-rims on her nose, a denim jacket over a flowery dress and boots. Suddenly they could be in a stolen motel room again, planning a life in Tallahassee, a happy life full of love and laughter, making their home together.

“I… I miss you too,” he gasps, and he means it: he misses her, this her, more than he can stand. At eighteen she’d let him in entirely, loved him, wanted him, trusted him, told him everything. This girl was the love of his life, and he broke her. The guilt that washes over him knocks him breathless. “Emma you don’t have to do that,” he says, when he can speak again. “You shouldn’t. I know this isn’t you anymore.”

She shrugs, and her form changes again, and she’s the version of her he recognises, red leather jacket and jeans, her blonde hair curling around her shoulders. “Better?” she teases, “Less like jail-bait?”

“How’re we supposed to talk this out if you have to lie to make me listen?” he sighs, shaking his head. 

“Neal,” she steps closer, pressing the back of her cool hand to his cheek. “Neal, this is still me. You know that, you know that all the dark magic and black leather in the world can’t change that. I just thought you might find me easier to talk to like this.”

“You want me to talk to you?” he asked. “How about talking about mysteriously padlocked basements?’

“I’m sorry?” Emma frowns, and Neal brushes her off.

“Cut the crap, Emma, you know what I mean. The basement in your house, the one with the big scary padlock on the door?”

“I have a lot of doors in my house, it’s huge.”

“What do you have hidden down there?”

“Don’t you trust me, Neal?” she all but pleads, and he shakes his head.

“It’s not that simple, Emma, and you know it. I don’t trust the Dark One,” he stipulates. “You I’d trust with my life, but that locked door? That screamed Dark One.”

“I am the Dark One,” she points out. 

“You won’t tell me?” he checks, with a sinking heart. She smiles, sly and secretive.

“I don’t need a locked door to hide things, not with my powers,” she points out. In that moment she’s the Dark One to her fingertips, tricky words and slippery lies and all: as far from blunt, straightforward Emma as she could get. Neal shudders, only thankful she hadn’t accompanied that little line with a twittering giggle and a showy hand gesture.

“That’s not an answer,” he points out, but she just shrugs, and he lets it pass. “You know what? Let’s just eat.”

She nods, and with heart-breaking familiarity she hops up onto the bonnet of the bug, as she must have done a hundred times outside convenience stores and gas stations, when the yellow bug was a warmer, cleaner seat than the dusty ground.  She’s abandoned her eighteen-year-old face, but every motion recalls those precious memories.

She digs her grilled cheese out of the bag, and takes a bite. “You know,” she says around her mouthful, as he scrambles up to join her, stretching out his legs next to hers on the bonnet. “I miss grilled cheese. I don’t really need to eat these days, but food is still pretty awesome.”

“Yes it is,” he nods, taking a bite of his own sandwich. “Man, do you remember those goddamn awful grilled cheeses at that place near Seattle?” he recalls, and she snorts through her nose and shakes her head.

“Yeah,” she winces, “I didn’t know grilled cheese could carry E Coli but apparently…”

Neal laughs at that, remembering the terrible runs and vomiting they’d suffered the next day, the money they’d had to spend on a motel room just for the bathroom. 

“See?” she looks at him, pleadingly, “I’m still me.”

“Emma, I never said you weren’t,” he reminds her. “Okay, there’s a distinction I don’t think most people get with this, but take it from someone who’s been through this before: the Dark One doesn’t change who you really are, deep down inside. It doesn’t change the important stuff: who you love, what you want, what you’d die for. What it does is change your actions, your choices: it makes you want new things to make the old ones easier to keep hold of. You love your kid? Well now slaughtering half the village to protect them seems like a great idea. Lying to them is necessary to keep them loving you. Locking them inside keeps them from outside threats. It doesn’t change your motives, it changes how you choose to go about achieving them. It makes terrible things seem like reasonable choices to make.”

“I’m not killing people, Neal,” Emma points out. “I’m just… I’m better now. Freer, a better version of me.”

“No one is better for this curse,” he tells her, flatly. “Again, take it from someone who knows. You’re an idiot if you believe it does.”

“You can’t understand this, not really, just… trust me that this is a change for the better. I see things so much clearer now, I feel… strong. Fearless. I mean, okay, look at who I was like this,” she gestures to the red leather jacket and jeans, her golden hair. “I was harsh, judgemental, closed-off. I was scared all the time. I was… I was scared of how I felt about you.”

“You had every right to be,” he reminds her. “After what I did to you, I never expected things to go back to how they were.”

“You’ve done so many wonderful things for me since then,” Emma argues. “You’ve fought for me, for Henry. I forgave you a long time ago. And I… I do love you. You know that. I never stopped loving you. But before this happened to me I never could have told you so, not in any way that meant anything. I’d have spent forever being too scared to say a word, too scared to do anything at all. Now? I’m not afraid of anything.”

Neal shudders, soul-deep, and shifts back, away from her, sick to his stomach. “What?” Emma asks, hurt.

“Emma, those are exactly the same words my father said to me when he came back after taking on the Curse,” Neal tells her, the words like ashes on his tongue. “After he killed a whole team of soldiers right in front of me. This curse makes you feel unafraid, invulnerable, but there’s a price for that. You become the thing making others afraid. You become the thing that hurts them.” He shakes his head, “Emma, I want to be with you more than anything, forever, but I can’t let this be what brings us together.”

“This was what brought your dad and Belle together!” Emma argues, “He was a coward before he was cursed, but as the Dark One he met his true love. They loved each other. Do you think they’d have managed that if he had been who he was before?”

“Yes,” Neal says, without a trace of doubt. “Because Belle loves in my father what I love in you: the person who existed before the Darkness took hold. My father was a good man before he became the Dark One, he was a good man who did everything he could to hold onto his family. I mean… he burned down a castle to save me, Emma. That he wasn’t willing to lie and kill, or that he was crippled and unable to fight… that didn’t make him a coward.”

“If he’d never been the Dark One, he’d never have been able to save you,” Emma says. “He was too weak to save you before, whatever the reason: you told me that story yourself. As a coward he ran, and you got caught. As the Dark One he could defend his family, and fight for what he wanted. He changed for the better, so have I.”

“My father was in an impossible situation,” Neal sighs, the memories of that time so long ago still painful. “But he still lost me. And what he did to fight for me wasn’t okay either. He killed countless people, he cursed a whole world, he kept you from your parents for twenty-eight years… none of that was okay, no matter his motivation. I mean, don’t you remember what he tried to do to Hook last year?”

That she barely blinks at the memory of her dead boyfriend chills Neal to his bones. For all he was never fond of Hook, he knew Emma had liked him, maybe even loved him, and his memory deserves to cause her a little pain. It sobers him: for all she looks and sounds so much like herself, this is a corrupt version of his love.

“He found you again,” Emma says, and Neal pushes himself down off the bonnet, and goes around to the trunk. Emma flashes around to join him, watching in confusion as he rummages around his stuff until he finds what he’s looking for.

“See this?” Neal says, holding up his old cloak, the only thing he has left of the day he fell through the portal. It’s rough brown wool, spun and woven with his father’s own two hands, and the only thing he’d kept of his life as Baelfire. It’s been in there nearly thirteen years, but there it still is, buried under mountains of other old crap. “Do you know the sheer mass of gold and silver and treasure he piled on me after he became the Dark One? I must have owned half the king’s treasury at some point, but this,” he shakes the cloak in her direction for emphasis, “this was what mattered to me. This is what I kept after, what I wore every day. Something simple, ordinary, the cloak a poor man wove for his young son, to keep him warm in the winter. I kept it because he made it before he turned into the Dark One. It was all I had leftover from a time when we were happy.”

He drops the cloak back into the trunk and shakes his head, turns away, memories and emotion clouding his head. His father kept that shawl for three hundred years, his love was that strong with or without the darkness,  and he could die today. Neal has to take a moment to collect himself. He hears Emma close the trunk behind him.

“What’s your point?” Emma demands, and Neal turns back to her.

“My point is that who you really are, the great mom who makes Henry so happy, the mischievous, clever kid I ran all over the country with, the saviour who’s saved this town a thousand times and brought Regina back to something resembling the light… that’s what matters. And you can try to be those things as the Dark One, the potential still exists in you, but it’ll be all… twisted and wrong. You’ll never get what you want or be happy like this, or be able to make anyone you love happy. You want proof? Look at my dad.”

“I can’t change this now, Neal,” Emma shakes her head. “I only hoped you could accept me, darkness and all.”

“Emma, dark or light, rain or shine, I’m always right here for you. I just don’t want you thinking I’m gonna shrug and call it a day and take what little I can get. You deserve to be the best version of you. That matters to me far more than your ability to love me. You matter more.”

“Do you still love me, Neal?” she asks, out of nowhere, and his eyes shoot back to hers in surprise. “If you don’t, I’ll leave you alone. I don’t want to force you into this if you don’t want to be with me.”

“Of course I still love you, Emma,” he tells her, without a second thought. “That’s why I can’t give up on you.”

She leans up and kisses him, softly and slowly, and Neal is weak: he kisses her back.

Then, a moment later, she’s gone. She leaves Neal all alone with two cold grilled cheese sandwiches, a head full of questions, and a heart that feels it might be breaking.

Neal lingers around town for a while after that, unwilling or unable to return to the shop just yet. He doesn’t know if their lunch was a success or a failure, and he doesn’t know what she’s up to. All he does know is that his father could die today and they haven’t a clue how to stop it.

When he returns to the diner, Belle’s talking to Robin at the counter, and they’re both smiling. “Hey,” she greets him as he arrives. “Thanks for the burger, Robin says you paid up.”

“Dark One covered my lunch,” he shrugs. “Figured I still owed you a meal.”

“How is Emma?” Belle asks, laying a comforting hand on his forearm. “What did she want?”

“To convince me she’s not a super-villain, apparently,” Neal replies. “Although the black leather look is sort of working against her there. I think she wanted us to get back together.”

“True Loves Kiss still not working, I’m guessing?” Belle’s brow creases with sympathy, as Neal shakes his head.

“I don’t think it’ll work until she stops thinking of herself and the Dark One as the same thing,” he tells her. “But it was nice to see her.”

“Yeah,” Belle smiles, and her eyes slide back to the rose. Only two petals left, and Neal’s stomach twists with phantom grief. They’ll be too late. “You know, I found that last ingredient while you were gone,” she tells him, and Neal’s heart leaps.

“What is it?” Neal asks, and Belle smiles.

“This is where you’re needed,” she tells him, “we need something that touched him when he was a man.”

“There’s my baby blanket,” he reminds her her, “And a football I had as a kid, they’re both in the shop.”

“I couldn’t find them,” she frowns, and Neal nods.

“He hid them,” he explains, “last year, after Zelena. He hid anything from before, because of the power they have. It’s okay, I know where they are.” He turns to Robin, who’s been quietly watching their conversation. “Also, I have another favour to ask. This one’s way more fun and dangerous than lunch, I promise.”

“What do you need?”

“I need a thief,” Neal grins, and Robin shakes his head.

“I’m a reformed thief,” he says, and Neal waves a hand.

“So am I, doesn’t mean I forgot how to pick a lock,” he grins. “I need an accomplice.”

“What’re we stealing?”

“There’s a locked basement in Emma’s mansion. Whatever she’s got down there she wouldn’t say a word to me, which makes me think it’s bad. Also probably something that could help in stopping and saving her.”

“I suppose I could get back into the game for one last raid,” Robin’s eyes gleam, and Neal grins back, realising he might just have made an actual friend. They shake hands, but then Robin’s grin fades, and his eyes slide from Neal’s to the counter. “Hey,” Robin’s gaze locks on the bell jar, the rose inside wilting rapidly. Neal’s heart starts to hammer, and Belle meets his eyes with the same panic and horror Neal himself feels. “Is the rose meant to do that?”

Their eyes tear back to the jar, where the rose is, miraculously, reforming, the petals returning to their former position. “He’s waking up!” Belle and Neal cry in unison, matching joyous smiles lighting their faces, and Neal’s fairly sure Belle knocks several cups off the coutner to smash on the floor as they run out of the diner, back to the shop.

They’re breathless, exultant, for this unexpected gift, this good luck they’ve been graced with. They hurtle back to the shop and through the main room, through the curtain, expecting to see Rumpelstiltskin sat up on the bed, his eyes bright and his smile relieved.

Neal bursts through the curtain with a happy cry, “Papa!”

Then, he stops dead with renewed shock, the shout dying on his lips. Belle almost crashes into the back of him as she runs in behind him, and then her eyes take in what he’s just seen: the bed is empty.

“He’s gone,” she gasps, and he spins on his heel to face her, and the jar she’s holding up. “But the rose…”

“He’s not gone,” Neal says, grimly, an important detail he’d missed earlier making itself clear in his memory. “He’s been taken.”

“Who would take him?” Belle wonders, aghast, but Neal knows exactly who, and knows Belle will catch up the moment the shock wears off. “Emma?” she gasps, the penny dropping, and Neal nods.

“Today at lunch… I showed her a cloak I’d had as a kid. I carried it to this land when I fell through the portal… papa spun and wove it for me before he was cursed. He’s in every strand of that thing and now…”

“She can use our spell,” Belle whispers, as if her lips are numb with terror, her eyes panicked. “She can wake him up.”


	5. Broken Kingdom

“Can’t sleep either, huh?”

Belle’s easily startled, for a woman whose husband had a propensity for teleporting behind people to spook them. Neal takes childish glee in making her jump out of her reading.

“Oh, Bae, hi,” she greets him, when she’s recovered herself. “I didn’t realise you were roaming the halls.”

“Things’re weird here,” Neal shrugs, coming a little closer into the room, shrugging. 

“I thought you might be with Emma,” Belle suggests, and Neal snorts, and shakes his head.

“Emma has her own room, and I’m not about to push her about that whole impulsive kiss incident. Not that it matters: Emma doesn’t sleep now anyway. My papa never slept after he was cursed, used to stay up all night spinning. I don’t know what she’s doing, but she won’t talk to me. The door is always locked.”

“You worry about her,” Belle murmurs, sympathetically, turning properly in her high-backed chair to look at him. He sits on the edge of her bed, bracing his forearms on his knees. Belle smiles her gentle, warm smile, and puts a hand over his. “You need to sleep, Bae,” she tells him, softly. “I know you worry… you have so much to worry about, but you can’t help anyone if you don’t rest.”

“What about you?” he counters, “It’s well past midnight, what’re you still doing up?”

“I was readying for bed and then…” she sighs, her face falling, eyes shifting to the rose that sits on her desk, beautiful in form and terrifying in meaning. “Another petal fell. I… he’s slipping away, Bae,” she says, and it’s awful to here patient, clever, capable Belle sound so lost and so helpless. “What if he dies thinking I never came back for him?”

“The last time I spoke to him, I called him a lost cause,” Neal tells her, his voice low and quiet with regret, with shame, with dread. “I told him if he kept going like he was… then I couldn’t forgive him again. What if he dies and that was the last thing I said to him? We’d just found each other again and then…”

“And then Zelena,” Belle murmurs. Her gaze drifts out the window and up to Regina’s tower, where Zelena sleeps under lock and key, guarded at all times.

“Way I remember it, we had a day, maybe two?” Neal shakes his head, “How do you hold onto something you only had for a moment?”

“He did,” Belle reminds him. “In his way. His way being deception, underhand dealing and outright murder, but still.”

Neal manages a small laugh at that, and Belle chuckles with him, exhaustion and grief and shared anxiety rendering the whole situation faintly absurd.

“We’ll see him again, Neal,” Belle assures him, when they’re silent and still again. “We’ll see him and he’ll know we love him. And then we’ll take turns smacking him for all the terrible things he put us through.”

“Let’s focus on waking him first,” Neal says, and Belle nods, letting go of his hand as he rises to his feet. “I’m going to keep walking. Maybe if I’m lucky I’ll stumble on some great dark secret.”

“It’s Camelot, Bae,” Belle points out. “It’s sort of known as the centre for goodness and valour.”

“Nah,” he grins, shakes his head, “Nothing’s as it seems. Shinier a place is, the more it’s rotten at the core. Take Regina, for example.”

“She’s not that bad, you know,” Belle says, and Neal frowns.

“Belle, she locked you in a tower and then an insane asylum for thirty years, then turned you into some sleazy barfly just to mess with my dad. She damaged my kid so badly he needed therapy at ten, then nearly killed him with a poison apple while trying to kill the woman I love… and then after all that she let Zelena live. And she’s all… smug and smirky like ninety per-cent of the time. So yeah, generally, I’m not a fan.”

“She’s apologised for what she did to me-“

“She ripped your heart out and used you as a puppet to hurt my father then wiped your memory of it less than two weeks ago. Then locked it up so it took two people to steal it back for you. Again, without your knowledge or consent.”

“And it’s my place to be angry about that, not yours,” Belle replies, calmly. “I’d have thought you’d want me focused on saving both your father and the mother of your child right now, rather than a grudge against a woman who is trying to be better, and is our best chance of helping Emma.”

“Maybe I just hate her because she got to raise Henry,” Neal mutters, but he doesn’t really believe it: as far as he’s concerned, there’re a hundred reasons to hate Regina.

“Henry’s a good kid, though,” Belle reasons. “And he’s forgiven her for what she did back then. In her way, she was as cursed as the rest of us, before Emma showed up. And now she’s as set on saving Emma and keeping him safe as we are. If you’re willing to give your dad a chance… I don’t know, maybe consider extending the same benefit of the doubt to Regina? He’s the one who made her who she is, after all.”

“She’s not cursed,” Neal points out. “She chose to let him do that to her.”

“She also saved us in Isaac’s alternative world,” Belle says. “She’s got the potential for good in her, as do we all. I don’t… I don’t always agree with her, or even trust her very much after what she did to my heart but… she did it because she thought Rumple was in league with Zelena, and that her true love was in danger. Rumple would do worse if it was one of us the witch had hostage, and you know it.”

“You think I should try to understand her?” Neal asks, feeling a little like a kid being lectured on tolerance by a grown-up. “Crimes against humanity and all?”

“I think we live in a very strange little community, and it’s easier to accept when someone’s genuinely trying to be better than hold past crimes over them. Snow suffered more than anyone at her hands, and she’s buried the hatchet. And that with Emma incapacitated for now, she’s your son’s mother. You two might have more to talk about than you think.”

“I’ll give her a chance if you promise to confront her about the heart thing when you get a chance.”

“If a time comes when we don’t have to work together for the greater good…” Belle sighs, and nods. “Then I’d like to have a lot of words with Regina about mutual respect. And about how I’m useful for more than books and hurting Rumple.”

“You’re useful for a lot of things, step-mother mine,” Neal teases, and pats her on the head. “You can… clean things? And serve decent tea? Those’re good qualities.”

“Oh shut up,” Belle glares at him, then ruins it entirely by laughing. “You’re just jealous I can ride a horse and you can’t.”

“Are women even allowed to read?”

“You’re also jealous I can read three languages and you fall down on wanted posters.”

“Nerd,” he sticks out his tongue, and she rolls her eyes.

“Layabout,” she teases, but he can see the fondness in her eyes, and he feels a sudden stab of relief that they can be here again, teasing and laughing, understanding one another. If his father never awakens again they’ll be all that’s left of their family, and it’s worth holding onto.

“I’m going to keep walking, see if I can find any bodies hidden behind hidden doors,” he says, and Belle snickers and nods.

“Let me know if you do,” she says. “I’ll be here, trying to decipher ancient Agrabahn healing remedies.”

“Good luck,” he bids her, and then leaves, continuing on in his circuit of the guest wing. 

He wanders as far as Regina’s tower, determined to have walked the whole castle by daybreak, and remembers Belle’s words as he starts on the stairs. Maybe she’s right: maybe it’s not worth clinging to his old, habitual dislike of Regina. Maybe it is pettier than it is noble, more about how he missed his son’s childhood than about anything she’s actually done. If nothing else, they do have a staggering amount in common on paper: they’re both Henry’s parents, and they’re both products of his father’s curse – Neal by abandonment, Regina by his corruption.

But she sleeps one door over from her sister, and Neal hasn’t the strength to be near Zelena, not now, not when he’s tired and anxious enough already. He works so hard to be unafraid of her, but she still haunts his nightmares.

He gets as far as the corridor outside Regina’s suite, when he hears a familiar voice, “Get out of my head.”

Emma’s voice is shaking, desperate, and Neal breaks into a dead run, arriving outside Regina’s study out of breath. He dodges just in time to miss the fireball hurled at his head. “Neal,” she whispers, a rush of relief and horror, and he holds up his hands.

“Just me,” he nods, stepping closer slowly, gently. “It’s just me, you’re safe: it’s okay.”

“He’s always here,” she murmurs, as if her lips are numb, as if she can hardly think straight. And Neal, remembering days his scaled father would stare into the distance, listening to voices no one else could hear, who would fight in the back yard with the night itself while he thought his son was asleep, nods and opens his arms.

Emma slips into his embrace easy as breathing, but she’s tense in his arms, and he holds her close but keeps his hold light, so she can break free whenever she needs. “He’s always here.”

“You’re exhausted, Emma,” Neal tells her, “And you’re hearing voices, aren’t you?”

“I’m…” she shakes her head, rests her chin on his shoulder, but he can tell she’s watching over his shoulder. “Not just hearing.”

“Is it… is it here now?” he asks, carefully. And she nods.

“He’s always watching,” she murmurs. “Always, I can’t get him out. He’s here. He’s always here.“

Neal swallows, hard, and wonders what the hell she’s seeing to render her voice so flat, so numb with horror. “Who is?” he asks, but she shakes her head, and buries her face in his shoulder. 

She says no more after that, goes all but limp in his arms. “Emma?” he prompts, but she doesn’t look at him, barely stands by herself when he pulls her out of his arms. Her eyes don’t close, but they don’t focus either. It’s as if her consciousness has pulled back, and left her a dead-eyed, incapable shell. 

Regina’s bedroom is next door, and Neal knows she returned with Robin to his rooms tonight, so at least there’s somewhere to take her. “Come on, Emma,” he murmurs, catching her under her arms, gratified at least when she leans on his side. “Let’s get you somewhere comfier, okay?”

She doesn’t respond, but allows him to half-carry her next door, and lie her down on the huge four-poster bed. “Wait right here, okay?” he requests, but she doesn’t even look at him.

Neal all but runs down the hall to the guard who stands watch at the door to the tower, “Hey, can you do me a favour?”

“Anything, Lord Cassidy,” the guard replies, and Neal has to hold back a snort at the fancy, made up title.

“Could you run and find the others in my party?” he asks, “Or at least Sir David and his wife?”

“Certainly, sir,” the guard nods, and then hesitates. “Is Lady Regina already upstairs?”

“No,” Neal shakes his head, “No I’m afraid the Lady Emma has fallen ill, and Regina’s room was the nearest. Could you find her too, please? And our son, Henry?”

“Of course, sir,” the guard salutes, and Neal holds back another ridiculous snicker as the young man strides off the down the hall in search of Emma’s extended family.

He returns to her side as quickly as he can, both grateful and scared that she hasn’t moved in the time he was gone. “We’re gonna help you, okay?” he soothes her, kneels at her bedside and strokes her soft golden hair. He imagines she nods, arches her head into his hand like she did when they were young, and she was sick in the back of the bug and he had to nurse her for two days with nothing but some saltine crackers, a blanket and a bucket.

That day she’d called him her hero, and he’d kissed her forehead and held her close, and they’d imagined it’d last forever. Now everything is different, and it’s his worst nightmare, the original curse that destroyed his first home, his first family, that renders her mute and dead-eyed, limp on the bed.

“Dad?” Henry arrives first, and runs to his father’s side, staring down at his mother. “Wh-what’s wrong with her?”

“I don’t know, son,” Neal shakes his head, still stroking her hair. “She just went silent. I think it’s the curse.”

Emma’s eyes blearily register Henry, who sits down beside her and holds her hand. “Hey, mom,” he says, quietly. “We’re here for you, okay? We won’t go anywhere.”

“Henry,” she breathes, and Neal is grateful beyond the telling of it to see the smallest smile pull at her mouth, even if it’s fleeting, even if it’s only for a moment.

Snow and Regina arrive a moment later, and Neal checks his impulse to glare at Regina’s disapproving, protective glance to Henry holding Emma’s hand. “I suppose it’s irrelevant why she’s in my bed and not her own?” she asks, but more out of curiosity than any malice, and all of it directed at Neal.

“If that’s your way of asking what happened…” Neal starts, annoyed already by her blunt tone, and Regina sighs and folds her arms.

“I’m sorry,” she nods, swallows, and he can see her outburst came from shock rather than selfishness. “What happened? Why is Emma passed out in my bed?”

“She was in your study,” Neal tells her, accepting the apology. “I don’t know why, when I found her she was…” he trails off, not wanting to reveal Emma’s secrets without permission. “She wasn’t herself.”

“The dagger,” Regina nods. “That’s the only reason she could have been there, she was after the dagger.”

“And she seemed to get worse when she was near it,” Neal agrees. “I really hate to say this, Regina, but maybe you’re right. Maybe it is better kept away from her.”

“For once we agree,” Regina’s eyebrows raise, and she nods.

“We need to keep Emma from succumbing to the darkness, by any means,” Neal says, the bile rising in his throat even as he speaks. 

This means restricting her freedom, denying her wishes. But this is the result of freedom, of leaving her to fight alone: it’s destroying her from the inside out, and her innate goodness, her Saviour magic, is making it a much longer fall than the night of pain his father endured. He’s watching her slip away, and more and more Neal realises how easy it is to forego moral considerations when the potential loss is this great. 

“She has to be saved,” Regina nods, lips pursed, “Even from herself, perhaps.”

For once, Neal and Regina are in perfect agreement, and it’s an oddly pleasant if unsettling feeling.

“What happened to her?” Snow asks, concern written all over her face, her eyes fixed on her near-comatose daughter.

“She hasn’t said a word in nearly half an hour,” Neal reports. “She thought I was an enemy when I found her and threw a fireball at me, she murmured something about the curse, and then… she was like this. She only just let me put her on the bed, I thought she might fall and hurt herself.”

“It’s getting worse, isn’t it?” David bursts in behind them, and everyone, even Emma, looks to see him.

Snow crosses to talk to him, and Neal can hear a fight going on in hushed whispers, something about King Arthur’s trustworthiness and a fabled knight who’s now apparently dead. He can’t hear most of it, they speak quietly and his attention is focused on Emma, and he’s grateful to Regina for marching over and breaking it up.

“Not in front of the patient!” she scolds, and they both shut up, their eyes casting guiltily to their daughter, listless on the bed. “Given the state that she’s in, anything could set her off. She needs rest,” Regina continues, coming closer, “Somewhere quiet, and away from prying eyes.” She comes to stand by Henry, and rests a supportive hand on his shoulder. He leans toward her a little, instinctively, for comfort. 

Neal shoots her a grateful glance, which she returns with a small, surprised but genuine smile. He’s forced to concede that maybe Belle has a point: maybe his son’s other mother isn’t Satan incarnate. Not anymore, at any rate.

“I know the perfect place,” Henry tells Regina, and Neal’s eyes meet his. “Maybe my dad and I should take her there. She’ll be safe with family, away from the castle.”

“That’s a good idea,” Neal agrees. He  rises up onto the balls of his feet, and smiles at Emma, trying to look encouraging but coming out sadder than intended, he thinks. “Come on, Emma,” he murmurs, “Let me and Henry take you someplace safe.”

He takes her hand, and to his surprise and relief she hauls herself upright, wordless and unfocussed but at least moving. He takes her arm again and Henry keeps hold of her hand, and together they manoeuvre her out of the door, and down through the castle.

Morning is breaking as they leave the castle, and Neal feels a bolt of nostalgia for long nights spent on the road, and the sun rising on the horizon. “Do you remember that?” he asks her, softly, as Henry breaks ahead to lead the way through the grounds, and he takes a better hold of Emma’s arm to keep her upright. In the daylight, the fresh air, Emma seems a little brighter, and even seems to be taking in her surroundings a little.

“Remember what?” she asks, her voice quiet and dull but at least she’s speaking.

“That night we drove all night away from Portland, our first all-nighter,” he smiles encouragingly at her. “And you were snoring in the passenger seat and I made you wake up, because you said you’d never seen a sunrise outside of a city.”

“Oh yeah,” she smiles, wan but present, herself a little more. “I remember. We had Red Vines for breakfast.”

“And then you threw up all over the side of the road and it was bright pink,” Neal grins. “That was an attractive moment for you.”

“Shut up,” Emma nudges him, affectionately. “You fell in love with me then and there.”

“Our eyes met over the fuchsia vomit and I knew you would be the mother of my child,” he places his hand over his heart, mockingly romantic.

That actually gets a laugh from her, and they walk together comfortably, talking occasionally but mostly enjoying the silence.

They’ve been walking for some time and are a way into the woods when Henry suddenly speeds up “We’re almost there!”

It’s a stable, part of the small village that serves the castle, and Henry strides in with a familiarity that reminds Neal he’s not been keeping close tabs on his son these past days. Regina’s usually the over-protective parent, but Neal supposes she’s been busy with research, and so Henry, apparently, has gone exploring.

“It’s nice here, right?” Henry asks Emma, eagerly, as he leads them inside. “A good place to rest.”

She nods, smiling gratefully, for all she still looks pale and tired.

“It is nice in here, even with the horse smell,” Neal looks around, smiling with pride at his son’s intelligence. “How’d you find it?”

“Well…” Henry pauses, then smiles, embarrassed, fidgeting his hands behind his back. “There’s this girl…”

Emma’s eyes snap to Henry, and Neal feels the world beneath him slip on its axis. Henry’s a tiny kid, he likes New York pizza and wooden swords, not girls.

But he is twelve, Neal supposes: he was only thirteen when he decided he was going to marry Morraine. He shakes the heavy feeling off after a moment. Morraine has been dead for hundreds of years, and he’ll never know what happened to her. It’s not worth dwelling on now.

“The girl from the ball?” Neal asks, and Henry nods, smiling a little broader. “I thought you two were getting along well.”

“She’s really nice,” Henry’s got the smile of a boy who can’t stop smiling, thinking about the girl he likes. Neal remembers that feeling well: there were days robbing convenience stores with Emma when he swore his face would break from smiling so hard. “Her name’s Violet. She brought me here: the stable belongs to her family. She wanted to show me the horses.”

“You know, when a girl wants to share the things she likes with you, it usually means what she really likes is you.” Neal confides, just for the joy of watching Henry blush. 

They’re just innocent kids messing around, he doubts they’ve even held hands yet, but he’s glad more than anything that Henry has a friend his own age, something new and good in his life that’s just for him, outside the influence of the adults in his life. Neal remembers how it was to watch his parent swallowed by the darkness, and on top of that Henry also has his new powers as the Author to contend with. 

It’s good he’s making friends, good he’s branching out away from his family and meeting kids his own age.

“So you two are getting close?” Emma asks, and for the first time, in her suspicious, serious tone and the strength of her gaze on Henry, Neal can see the true echoes of the monster his father became. Where he sees Henry growing up, making a healthy emotional connection to someone new, making friends his own age at long last, Emma sees a threat. Emma sees Henry out of the safety of her protection, out of bounds, out of sight, with a girl she doesn’t know.

And Neal, to his horror, sees the same possessiveness that drove his father to locking them in their home, and isolating him from his friends. Even, in fact, from the girl he himself had taken a shine to at that age.

Emma’s smiling, or trying to smile, and Neal can see her better instincts warring with the darkness inside. “No, not at all,” Henry covers, quickly, but Neal can see the shock in his son’s eyes, too, hearing that tone from his mother. “We’re just hanging out.”

Emma nods, relaxing a little, keeping smiling, and Neal is about to say something, to back his son up, when a soft, young female voice comes from outside the stable. “Hello? Who’s in there?”

“That’s her!” Henry cries, alarmed, “Hide! Hide!”

Emma nods, and takes Neal’s hand, and drags him to the back of the stable, despite Neal being quite curious to meet his son’s new friend. He understands, though: Henry needs something that’s his, that’s just his, and if he really likes this girl Neal can understand not wanting to meet the parents just yet. “Hi, this is my mom, the Dark One, and my dad, the son of the last Dark One,” wouldn’t really inspire confidence.

The same pretty girl from the ball comes rushing in, and immediately smiles when she sees Henry. “Henry,” she beams, breathlessly, clearly overjoyed to see him. “What’re you doing here?”

“I was wondering… if you’d be interested in taking me riding?” Henry ad libs, and Neal has to be impressed with how well his son lies. That’s a skill he could have gained from either side, but he likes to think it came from him. 

He nudges Emma from where they’re knelt, hidden and Emma manages a smile back, watching their son curiously.

“Yes, I’d love to,” Violet smiles, and Emma’s eyebrows rise. “Come on, I’ll introduce you to Nicodemus!”

“Is that… your dad?” Henry frowns, a little worried, and Neal almost snickers: how scared can Henry be of a normal human father when his parents are who they are? 

“No,” Violet laughs, “my horse.”

Henry nods, and Emma and Neal relax for a second, everything seeming fine, friendly, as normal as life can be for their son.

Then Violet smiles, a little flirtatiously, “I hope you’re ready to get your heart racing.”

Emma starts at that, staring at the girl who’s innocent, and twelve, and has done nothing wrong. Neal takes her arm, gently, to prevent her from going over there and ruining Henry’s first crush by forcing them apart or blasting the girl to smithereens.

Or, he shudders, turning her into a snail and stepping on her.

Henry swallows, manages a helpless nod, utterly entranced by the pretty girl who’s smiling at him, and then all but runs after her out of the stables. Neal’s grinning – his son’s got it bad, and it’s adorable and really encouraging, knowing some things in Henry’s life can be normal – but Emma looks worried.

“That was possibly the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen in my life.” Neal grins, spreading his arms wide, walking backwards to face Emma as she comes out of their hiding spot. 

“Yeah, he’s got a crush,” Emma says, not sharing Neal’s joy, still staring at the closed door where Henry just vanished with Violet. “And he straight up lied to my face about it, and I’m the Dark One.”

“Yeah, about that,” Neal fidgets his hands a little, trying to look non-threatening as he tells her, “He started talking about her, and you looked a little… Dark One-y. You sort of glared at him like you were plotting her murder.”

“You think I scared him?” Emma looks horrified with herself, and instinctively Neal takes her hands in his, trying to reassure her that he’s not afraid of her. 

“No,” Neal shakes his head, his shoulders slumping, the need to tell her what he saw seeming unimportant now. It’ll only upset her, and who knows better than he does how little she can help it? “No I think you’re his mother, and all kids lie to their parents about this stuff.”

“You think mother trumps Dark One?” she asks, and Neal considers it.

“Well, mine vanished off with your ex when I was five, so I wouldn’t know. I think I’d have been as reluctant to tell my dad if I had a crush before he got cursed as I was after, though for different reasons. I think you should watch and see what he tells Regina, to be honest.”

Emma laughs at that, “God,” she murmurs, “I have no idea how that’ll go.”

“Either great or terrible,” Neal shrugs, grinning, “nowhere in-between.”

“I can’t decide if she’ll kill Violet or start planning the wedding.”

“Speaking of killer instincts,” Neal segues, “Do you want to talk about last night, now? It feels like something you need to be sharing.”

“It’s…” Emma looks uncomfortable, but he squeezes her hands, and she squeezes back, trustingly. “It’s your dad, Neal. It’s Rumpelstiltskin.”

Neal stares at her, frowning, “Emma, my dad’s in a coma in Storybrooke, tied to Belle’s rose… trust me, if he was up and talking, she’d know.”

“It’s not,” Emma shakes her head, “it’s not really him. It’s… he’s like he was when we saw him in the past. Remember, scaly, wearing leather?”

“Oh, I remember,” Neal nods, because while that’s not a terrible memory, he remembers his father scaled well before that. He remembers his father corruptive, cruel, sneering. He remembers the Dark One, and the thought of him without his father’s humanity bleeding through, holding his intentions in check… Neal shudders.

“It’s something that looks like that, at least. I’ve been seeing him in my head, ever since we got to Camelot. He says he’s my guide, and he seems so real.”

“He was there at the stone circle,” Neal nods, releasing her hands and stepping back, horrified. “With the archer girl, Merida.”

“When I almost crushed her heart,” Emma nods. “Yeah, he was there. He was telling me to do it.”

Her eyes drift up, over his shoulder, and widen. Neal spins around, but of course there’s nothing there, no one. 

“My father heard the same voice,” he tells her, his eyes still on that place where she’s staring, where she can see his father’s worst self and he cannot. “It must have taken another form with him, his predecessor, but I remember… there was a night, by the fire, only a few days after he was cursed,” he turns back to her and she’s watching him closely, clinging to his words, to the memory of a man who suffered as she now suffers, and might even survive it. “I was pretending to sleep, but I couldn’t. I watched as he talked in circles with the empty chair my mother used to sit in. He kept talking about the dagger, and his power, and keeping me safe, but there was no one there.”

“Am I going to lose myself, like he did?” Emma asks, her voice so small it breaks his heart. “Lose you, and Henry? Become cruel like that?”

“He wasn’t always cruel,” Neal reminds her. “He was always at his best with the people he loved. When he was alone with me or with Belle, able to just be himself.” He thinks for a moment, smiling, “Doing something that made him happy,” he continues, an idea forming, “You know, you were always happiest when you were stealing something.”

“I don’t see any yellow bugs around here to hotwire,” Emma’s eyes narrow, and Neal grins.

“No, but there’s a whole load of horses, and they won’t miss just one.”

Emma thinks for a minute while Neal shoots her his most beguiling grin, and finally she gives in with a little, snorting laugh, and nods, allowing him to take her hand again. “Come on, then,” she says, “let’s go boost us a horse.”

They run out of the stables and down the little hill, to the paddock where the horses are eating their grass. “Oh come on, the gate’s on a latch,” Neal rolls his eyes, “Westerns make horse rustling seem a lot harder than it is.”

“We haven’t rustled any horses yet,” Emma points out. “And Henry will kill us if we upset his friend.”

“We’ll have it back by midday,” Neal waves a hand, brushing off her concerns. “We’re parents now, we have to steal responsibly.”

Emma laughs again at that, and points to a chestnut mare close to them, that’s already saddled up. “Okay,” she nods, “that one looks like it’s ready to go, got all it’s… upholstery, and stuff.”

“I think it’s called a saddle,” Neal corrects her. “I might not have been any fancy knight’s son but I at least know it’s a saddle.”

“I’ll get its reins,” Emma whispers, as they creep closer, keeping low like they might get caught. “You take the side.”

“That sounds as good a plan as any,” Neal nods. It doesn’t work out that way: the mare is tame, sensible, but it rears away from Emma anyway and it’s up to Neal to grab the reins, and pretend he knows anything at all about horses.

“Okay, at least cars don’t hate you on sight,” Emma sighs, as they walk the horse out of the paddock and back into the woods, closing the gate behind them.

“What did your little friend have to say about that?” Neal asks, trying to turn her possession, the haunting of his father, as a joke. Emma rolls her eyes.

“Apparently the horse can sense my darkness, whatever the hell that means,” Emma tells him.

“Okay, but horses are also scared of snakes, loud noises, and anyone remotely afraid of riding another animal at breakneck speed without breaks,” Neal points out, reasonably. “They’re pretty but they’re not that bright.”

Emma accepts that reasoning, and they walk a while longer through the dappled sunlit forest, until they’re well out of sight of the stables and have found a flat place, like a woodcutters track, to stop and admire their steal.

“Okay, now one of us has to ride it,” he says. “I volunteer you, as the princess between us.”

“Me?” she holds up her hands, her eyes wide, “Oh no, this was your idea. You’re the one not covered in anti-horse darkness evil smell, you try.”

“Your parents are militant royalty!” Neal counters. “You’re the one born for this.”

“Who said ‘hey Emma, we should steal a horse’? Hint: it wasn’t me.”

“Okay, okay, you know what, let’s make a deal,” Neal says, and Emma stares at him.

“You of all people are making deals with the Dark One?” she asks, sceptically, and he grimaces.

“Fair point, okay,” he tries again, “Call it a bet, then. I’ll get on the horse, and see if I remember how to do it from the one time a soldier in the village showed me. If I can do it, then you have to get on with me, okay?”

“Okay,” Emma eyes the horse sceptically, “but it hates both of us. It knows we stole it and it wants revenge.”

“It does not!” Neal cries, “Does being the Dark One come with being a drama queen?”

He approaches the horse, and tries to remember what Sir Ancoat told him, three hundred years and a world away, when he was showing all the children of the village how to ride. Back then, Baelfire had believed it was a kindness, a rite of passage. Later he learned it was training: recruitment for the war.

He swings himself up on the stirrup and, amazingly, is on the horse, astride it, like riding a bike. “Oh yeah!” he cries. “Told you!”

“Damn,” Emma mutters, and then her eyes zone out, her gaze shifting to the woods. “Go away!” she shouts, to nothing, to empty air, to the monster stalking them. Neal keeps his gaze on her.

“The only way to make him go is to pretend he’s not there,” he tells her. “If you let him mess with you it’ll only make it worse.”

“What’s the point, Neal?” Emma demands. “Your dad succumbed to it eventually, I will too. The monster’s only here to tell me what I already know, I can’t escape what I’m going to become.”

“My father didn’t have anyone to help him,” Neal reminds her. “I was just a boy then, and I couldn’t do anything. You have me, and your parents, and Regina and Henry, all fighting for you. You just have to put your faith in us.”

“You really think we can do that?” she demands, astounded. “Stop the darkness, go home, and be a happy family as always? Live the lives we’ve been trying to live for the past year?”

“I think you’re the strongest person I know,” he tells her, honestly. “And that you love very deeply, and that you’re very much loved.”

“Why do you keep trying, Neal?” she asks, helplessly. “In Neverland, after Zelena, after Hook… and now, with this? I’m literally being consumed by the reason you lost your father. How are you still here with me? How have you not been driven away yet?”

“You know why,” he tells her, simply. “I’m never going to stop fighting for you. I’m never going to let go. I did it once, and it was the worst thing I’ve ever done. Nothing you could do to me would balance that out. Nothing you could do would make me stop loving you. I’m here until the bitter end, Emma, and when it’s over, I’ll still be there, and we’ll go home like we planned.”

She looks at him, open and scared but real as she hasn’t been for days. He pats the saddle behind her.

“Come on,” he invites. “Let’s be stupid kids again, for just a minute. I’m sure if we ride for long enough we’ll find something cool. Who knows,” he grins, “maybe we’ll even catch Henry getting his first kiss.”

Emma rolls her eyes, but they’re misty, wide, desperate to believe, and when he holds out his hand to help haul her onto the horse, she takes it gladly. She straddles it, and with Neal holding the reins the horse, amazingly, doesn’t spook.

They set off at a trot, neither of them comfortable going any faster. Neal gives a little whoop of childish excitement, and Emma, despite her unease and her fear, follows it with one of her own.

They ride for what feels like hours, but probably isn’t, and go wherever seems pretty, wherever seems easy to ride. After a while Neal starts to remember more of what he’s doing, and Emma relaxes and stops staring at random patches of the scenery, and he digs in his heels, taking them to a gallop. They’re both laughing, wobbling, trying not to fall, the adrenaline causing her to grip his waist a little tighter, to shout a little louder.

They don’t make it all that far before the horse, sensing the terrible riders it has, turns and sends them careening back toward the stables. She all but throws them off when she finds her way home again, and Emma shakes her head as she tries to regain her balance, and directs the horse back into the paddock.

“We’re terrible thieves,” she murmurs, shaking her head after the retreating steed. “The stolen goods returned herself.”

“We stole her time, energy,” Neal tries, “that… counts, right? And hey,” he reaches to the side of the stable wall, to a climbing rose bush, and plucks a yellow bloom from the tangled branches. “Look, more theft!”

“It’s beautiful,” she sniffs it, and curtseys, like a lady in her white dress and cloak. She snickers, and so does he, bowing to her. “Thank you, Neal.”

“Is he still there?” he asks, gently. “Or did the thievery manage to distract you a little?”

“Not just that,” she looks up at him, smiles, a smile he hasn’t seen in a long time. The smile she used to wear right before she kissed him. “I mean it helped, it reminded me of who I was, who we were, the person I want to be again. But you were right,” she tells him. “I need to be with people I love… and who love me.” She steps close, into his personal space, and for once her eyes are clear of the darkness, and he can see only her, only his Emma, looking back at him. “I do love you, Neal,” she tells him, very gently, very softly. “It’s the wrong time to say it, and it probably doesn’t mean much, but I still do. I always have, I always will.”

“I love you too,” he tells her, as if she needs reminding. “If you let that fill you up, there’s no room for the darkness.” She nods, smiling and peaceful at last, and then they’re kissing, the first kiss they’ve had in a decade that’s real, pure, and full of love.

She’s warm and soft in his arms, arms wrapped around his shoulders, and his around her waist, one hand cupping her cheek. He holds her in place to kiss her the way he remembers she enjoys, his lips teasing hers, tongue dancing with hers. She tastes like Emma, and the fresh air; she tastes like home.  


	6. Dreamcatcher

“So he staged a jail-break?” Neal says, peering through the bars to Arthur’s squire’s empty cell. “He’s talented if he managed that – he locked the door behind him.”

“Maybe he used magic?” David guesses, turning to Arthur, “Did your squire possess such a power?”

“Not that I ever saw,” Arthur replies, scratching his beard. “He must have had the bean on his person, used it to escape.”

“How could he be so selfish?” Guinevere demands, “We could all be home by now!”

“Desperate times,” Arthur shrugs, but something doesn’t sit right with Neal.

“I don’t think it was a bean,” Neal muses, crouching to look at the floor of the cell. “I’ve fallen through enough portals, they always leave a really weird taste in the back of your mouth. Also they mess up the floor like crazy, leave this huge scorch mark behind.”

“How would you know this?” Arthur demands, “Are you a wizard too?”

“ _Son_  of a wizard,” Neal corrects, rising to his feet. “Listen, you might be right, but this doesn’t look like a bean to me. What did the CCTV footage show?”

“Camera’s smashed in,” Regina frowns, “but we don’t know when that happened. We have no reason to believe the two are related.”

“It could even have been leftover from the Snow Queen’s curse,” Mary Margaret admits. “This office has seen a lot of damage this past year.”

Guinevere and Arthur are staring at them, bemused. “How often do these strange occurrences happen here?” Guinevere asks, curiously. Regina shrugs.

“Oh, only a few times a month,” she replies, dryly. 

“It must be very hard for the people,” Guinevere muses, sadly. “We should do something to raise their spirits. The despair of being away from Camelot, the uncertainty your own people face… it causes whatever tragedy befell the Squire. Who knows what else it could lead to?”

“Well, you’re right,” Mary Margaret agrees, thoughtfully. “People need hope. And as your hosts, and the leaders of this town,” she looks to David, who nods with solidarity, “It is up to us to provide it.”

“What do you have in mind?” Regina asks, and Neal conceals a smile at her obvious displeasure at Mary Margaret and David assuming the mantel of ‘leaders’, while she still occupies the Mayor’s office. Neal doesn’t mention anything about fair and honest elections or popular sovereignty. It wouldn’t make any difference anyway.

Neal glances to Henry, who’s suspiciously quiet, and is surprised to see his son bent over his phone, texting like his life depends on it. Neal meets David’s gaze, who nods, and quietly sidles over to Henry’s side. He peers over his shoulder at the text messages, as unsubtle as its possible to be.

Henry’s eyes suddenly shoot up to meet Regina’s, and Neal hears him try to sound casual and spontaneous. “How about a dance?”

“A dance, huh?” David settles himself in beside Henry, arms folded. “Looking for an excuse to ask your girlfriend out on a date?”

“Girlfriend?” Regina starts, eyes widening, “What girlfriend?”

“You saw her, Regina,” Neal winks at Henry. “The pretty girl Henry was with in Granny’s the night after we got back from Camelot? Tiny, long dark hair?”

“She’s not my girlfriend!” Henry denies, immediately, and Neal chuckles and shakes his head.

“Who is this? Who’s not your girlfriend?” Regina demands, trying desperately to look cool and fun and failing completely.

“I think a dance is exactly what we need.” Mary Margaret puts Henry out of his misery, placing a supportive hand on his shoulder. 

“Henry who’s this girlfriend?” Regina presses, unable to let the issue go. 

“You played her the song, right?” Henry nods, smiling at least at the memory, and Neal grins. “Oh, she’s  _totally_  gonna be your girlfriend. No girl can resist that move.”

“You’ve been teaching my son  _moves_?” Regina demands, rounding on Neal. Neal rolls his eyes.

“I told  _my_  son how I met his mother,” he clarifies. “And if he happened to learn from that success story and play the same song for a girl he likes…”

“That success story ended with a pregnant teenager behind bars,” Regina retorts. “Not exactly the lesson we want to be passing along.”

“Woah, mom,” Henry holds up his hands, and Mary Margaret sweeps in to the rescue. 

“I think a ball is exactly what Storybrooke needs,” she says, taking Regina firmly by the arm and leading her out of the room. “Come on, Regina, let’s get planning.”

“So, who’s this girlfriend?” Regina keeps asking, even as they leave the sheriff’s office and go out onto the street. “What do you know about her?”

“I’d say she’s probably already knocked up, and she definitely has a criminal record,” Neal teases. “Probably an axe-murderer, to be honest.” Regina glares at him, entirely unamused. “Come on, Regina, they’re thirteen. Stop scaring the poor boy.”

“I’m not scaring him I’m-“ she’s cut off when Belle comes tearing over the street, the rose in the crook of her arm, her eyes wild. “Bae!” she cries, “I’ve been looking everywhere for you!”

“I was just coming to meet you,” he replies, stepping forward to face her properly. “The squire went missing, I was helping look for signs of a portal. What’s wrong?”

“What’s all this about?” Regina asks, and Belle turns to her.

“The squire’s not the only one who’s missing,” she says. “Rumple’s also vanished. And I –  _we_ – think he’s woken up.”

“Why did you need me?” Neal asks, concerned. Belle swallows, and catches her breath.

“I found the plans for the new Storybrooke, with Emma’s house added,” Belle tells him. “They were in the shop, as if they’d always been there. It confirmed what you and Robin thought about a basement. I think it’s where she must be keeping him.”

“Robin?” Regina turns to her boyfriend, who nods.

“Belle and Neal told me Emma was hiding something down there yesterday,” he explains. “We were planning to go and investigate, when the squire vanished and Belle discovered Rumpelstiltskin was waking up.”

“We need to find him,” Belle insists. “Before Emma can do her worst.”

—

“I don’t like this,” Neal mutters, as they climb the stares to Emma’s bleak, nightmarish home. “Not one bit.”

“Which part?” Regina asks, “The breaking and entering or the lying to Emma? You’re pretty adept at both, from what I hear.”

“I don’t like using my son as bait to tempt the Dark One away,” Neal says, his teeth gritted. “Dark Ones make terrible parents, I would know. I don’t like putting him in harm’s way.”

“Emma won’t hurt Henry,” Belle soothes him, gently, her hand on his arm. “Of everyone in town, he might be the only one who’s safe with her.”

“Did you even tell him what we were planning?” Neal demands. Regina shrugs.

“No, I didn’t want to make him lie to her,” Regina says. “I told him to tell us when she was coming back, so we’d know he was safe. He’ll keep his word.”

“So you lied to him,” Neal nods, sarcastically. “Great, because lying to kids always works out for the best.”

“I’m keeping him safe,” Regina snarls. “Keeping him from being complicit, so Emma won’t have a reason to turn on him. At least I’m not corrupting him with wild sex stories.”

“He asked me a few months ago how Emma and I got together!” Neal cries. “I told him I played her my favourite song, and told her how it always made me think of her. Honesty and a little thoughtfulness, that’s all. I didn’t throw condoms at him and talk about positioning in the back of a car!”

“Enough!” Robin shouts, “For pity’s sake, we have a job to do! This isn’t time for bickering!”

“Thank you,” Belle smiles at him, and Neal takes a deep breath.

“You’re right,” he nods. “Papa needs us. Let’s get started.”

Regina reaches for the door handle, and then recoils as a burst of magic blasts her away. “Damnit,” she mutters, “A protection spell.”

“So Regina’s unwelcome,” Neal says. “That’s unsurprising. And after our last meeting, I’m guessing I’m probably also barred.”

“Henry,” Belle murmurs, then louder, “She’d let Henry in!” She turns to Regina. “Do you have anything of his on you?”

Regina waves a hand, and summons Henry’s familiar grey and red striped scarf. “I do now,” she smiles, and covers her hand with the cloth, using it to open the door. It clicks open easily, and she smiles. “Thank you, Henry: you’re our hero.”

“I don’t know what’s worse,” Neal mutters to Belle, “That she’s using my kid without his knowledge, or she doesn’t realise that was your idea.”

Belle rolls her eyes and shakes her head, “I’m used to it,” she says, and seems genuinely unperturbed. “As long as I’m helping, who cares about credit?”

“You’re a better person than I am, then,” Neal says, and Belle grins and sticks out her tongue.

The door to the basement is locked, but not with magic, and Robin’s tools make quick work of the various padlocks. The staircase down into the underground room are rocky and uneven, and Neal offers Belle his hand in getting down, imagining her falling in her high heels.

She rolls her eyes, and then laughs at him when of the two of them he’s the one to slip. “My balance in my heels is better than yours in sneakers,” she whispers to him. He doesn’t let go of her hand: apparently he needs the stability.

Excalibur, the infamous sword, rests in the stone, lit by a shaft of cold sunlight from high above. Neal hears Belle draw breath quickly with surprise, but honestly it’s a far less terrible secret than what he’d been imagining. In his most lurid thoughts, he’d worried she had a whole torture chamber down here. Some bars and a sword is a relief, in a way.

No sign of Rumpelstiltskin, however. His heart sinks to know his father is once again captured and far from help, and he knows Belle, whose eyes are casting about the room desperate for clues, feels the same way.

“I guess now we know why she didn’t want you down here,” Regina addresses Neal, and he nods.

“I doubt she’d want anyone to know she had this,” he tells her. “And it’s pretty obvious why. Look familiar?”

Belle peers down at the sword, and runs her fingers through the air over the blade, not quite touching. “Neal’s right, we’ve seen this before. The sword looks exactly like the dagger… they have the same design, the same edges.”

“What the hell does she want with this?” Regina breathes. “And with Gold? What is she up to?”

“Well, given our missing memories, I’m guessing whatever it is it’s not good,” Robin says, decisively. Neal nods in agreement.

“We could try to pull it out?” he suggests. “I mean, one of us has to be heroic enough to budge it a little, right?”

“Much as I enjoy the thought of being Henry’s only parent,” Regina snaps, as Neal’s hand strays close to the hilt, “You need to move your hand back.”

“Why?”

“This is the focus of Emma’s plans, so it’s probably booby-trapped, and I don’t think she’d have been too picky on who got caught out. You could get killed. Then where would Henry and Emma be, much less your father?”

“Wow, Regina,” he gapes, gobsmacked. “Is that actual care for my wellbeing?”

“Not in the slightest,” she assures him, but he can see at least half of it is a front. “But Henry needs his father, and I’m sure Gold would murder me if I let anything happen to you. So for their sake, try not to find a really stupid way to die.”

Belle has wondered around the sword’s stone, to the bars facing it. She picks something off the ground, and when she turns Neal can see ominous ropes hanging from her fingers.

“He was here,” she says, in that grave, matter-of-fact way she has when she’s trying to appear strong and brave but really wants to cry. “Rumple was here.”

“She had him tied up?” Neal’s hands ball into fists, as frustration and anger and sympathy for his father all rush to the surface at once. It’s a strange feeling, to be so angry with Emma on his father’s behalf, and not the other way around.

“Clearly, for a while anyway,” Robin nods. “But he’s gone now. Let’s search the rest of the house – maybe we can find out where she took him.

Regina’s phone rings just then, and a glance at her texts causes a look of alarm. “No time for that,” she tells them, “that was Henry: she’s on her way back.”

They take their cue from that, leaving the sword and the ropes behind and rushing back up the stairs and into the main house. 

They’re on their way out, almost to the front door, when Neal spots something achingly familiar sat on a table just across the room. “Hey, guys?” he calls them over, as he crosses to investigate. 

“What are you doing? What is it?” Regina demands, but they all follow him.

A dream catcher lies on top of a box on Emma’s table, and Neal’s hand shakes as he picks it up, and holds it in front of him.

“What is that?” Robin asks, confused. A lump rises in Neal’s throat.

_-_

_“It’s a Native American dream catcher,” Emma grins as she holds it up, bringing it closer so he can see. “It’s supposed to keep out bad dreams and protect your home.”_

_“It’s flypaper for nightmares?” Neal asks, intrigued, although he’s a world away from magic, and nothing in this world or any other could give him a peaceful night’s sleep. “Let’s keep it.”_

-

“It’s a dream catcher,” Neal says now. “I… we found one, a long time ago, before Henry was born. I kept it… and Emma found it in New York and brought it back with us when we came to Storybrooke.”

“Is this the same one? Some… sentimental token?” Robin asks. Neal shakes his head.

“No, this one’s different… it looks similar, but there’s something odd about it. It doesn’t feel right.” It feels full, as if the empty spaces are simply transparent, caught up with something else. It feels bloated, heavy, as if it can hold no more bad dreams. Neal wonders if that’s its purpose, but then the Dark One does not sleep.

“Why would she have this?” Belle asks, “If it’s not sentimental, and Emma’s not really superstitious…”

“Because,” Regina smiles, and takes the dream catcher from Neal’s willing hand, “they can be more than just objects of folklore. When imbued with magic they can be quite powerful.” She smiles, pieces falling into place behind her eyes, “I think I know how Emma took our memories.”

—

_Camelot_

“Henry?” Neal turns from his chair to see Henry stood in the door, his face sombre. “Hey, what’s up?”

“I think there’s something wrong with me,” Henry says, and Neal’s heart clenches with concern as Henry steps closer, into the room. Neal crosses to him quickly, and closes the door behind him, so they have some privacy.

“Okay, first of all, are you cursed?” he asks. Henry blinks.

“What? No, not cursed.”

“You’re certain?” Neal checks, “'Cause that’s exactly what a cursed person would say.”

“I promise you I’m not cursed,” Henry insists.

“Then what happened?” Neal asks, gesturing for Henry to take a seat on the edge of his bed, while Neal turns his chair to face him. “Why do you think something’s wrong with you?”

“I…” Henry takes a deep breath. “Okay, first things first: my moms got Merlin out of the tree. They’re taking him to Granny’s right now, to keep him safe from Arthur.”

“What?” Neal gasps, “When did this happen?”

“Only, like, an hour ago,” Henry assures him. “They were trying to keep it as quiet as they could, so Arthur wouldn’t interfere… Emma says he’s actually plotting against her.”

“Yes, she told me that,” Neal nods. “And your grandparents?”

“Safe at Granny’s,” Henry assures him. “Merlin’s going to lift the curse as soon as he can. We’re meeting there tomorrow to work out what next.”

“Okay,” Neal nods, processing the information. “So… why do you look like someone killed a puppy in front of you?”

“That’s what’s wrong with me,” Henry sighs. “I… I helped save Merlin tonight, and I can’t feel happy about it. I just feel kind of empty.”

“Why?” Neal frowns, worry twisting in his gut, “What happened, Henry?”

“Okay, you know that girl, from the ball?”

“The one you stole my totally killer move to impress?” Neal asks, and draws the smallest of smiles from Henry. “Told you keeping Only You on your iPod would be useful someday.”

“I didn’t keep it for that reason,” Henry mutters, but Neal doesn’t press it. “She… it didn’t work. I did everything you told me… and mom even admitted it worked on her, but…”

“It didn’t work?” Neal guesses. Henry shakes his head, miserably. “You know, I was joking about Only You being fool proof, right?”

“I just thought if I could be myself… if I showed her something that matters to me and tried to make her laugh… maybe she’d like me,” Henry finishes. There’re tears running down his face now, not his first of the evening by Neal’s reckoning. “That’s how you said you made mom like you, right?”

“I have to admit, it did look like she liked you when we saw you,” Neal tells him. “But there can be a thousand reasons why someone says no, why things don’t work out. Maybe some former acquaintance with foresight showed up and convinced her to abandon you for your own good. That’s what broke up your mom and me.”

He’s joking, trying to make Henry laugh, but for once it isn’t working. Neal sobers, and comes to join Henry on the bed, wrapping an arm around his shoulders.

“Or maybe she just doesn’t like me,” Henry mumbles. “Because I’m boring, and weak, and I can’t ride a horse or sword fight properly, and all I ever do is tell stories.”

“There can be a thousand reasons why someone doesn’t want to be in a relationship,” Neal tells him. “Did she say any of those things were the reason?”

“No,” Henry admits. “She just said she preferred us as friends, but-“

“Then stop talking,” Neal cuts him off. “Listen to your old man, for once I’m going to be wise.”

“I’d like to see that,” Henry mutters, and Neal chuckles, thankful his son still has a sense of humour. 

“Insolent boy,” Neal chides, and ruffles Henry’s hair affectionately. “Alright, I have a question for you. Taking for granted that everything you just said about yourself is total crap, which it is, and if you say it again I’ll tell your scary mom and she’ll deal with you.”

“Which one’s the scary one?” Henry asks, and Neal has to think about it.

“I originally meant Regina but now you mention it… okay, yes, if you say one more bad thing about yourself I’ll tell both your moms, and see what happens. I like explosions,” he muses, “they’re all bright and warm.”

“They already know,” Henry reminds him. “I found them first. And they said I might not be her hero, but I was theirs. But that… it didn’t help, you know? It just feels like my moms think I’m cool but no one else ever will.”

“Henry, I don’t think cool covers you. You saved Storybrooke from the curse, reunited your mom and me, helped the Evil Queen redeem herself, and saved us all from Peter Pan, all before your twelfth birthday. And yes, you had help with some of that, but if you hadn’t jumped a bus to Maine, ten years old with a stolen credit card and no one to call for help, we’d all still be living our lives, trapped and alone. You tell stories because you know that preserving the past is as important as fighting for the future. You’re smart, and kind, and interesting, and brave. And you know what?”

“What?”

“I’m a hundred per-cent sure this girl knows that.”

“Then why doesn’t she like me?” Henry asks, and Neal shakes his head.

“Kid, I think you’ve been a little messed up from all the romance flying around: you’ve seen Emma dating, Graham and Hook and Walsh; you’ve watched Regina and Robin, your grandparents… but you know what? Romance isn’t everything.” Neal pulls his arm away so he can look Henry in the eye properly, and sighs, shaking his head. “Henry, do you know how long Emma and I had known each other before I got up the nerve to tell her that, to me, that song was about her? That I was in love with her?”

“No?”

“Six months,” Neal tells him. “And it took me so long because I was worried we wouldn’t be friends anymore if I screwed it up, and that would have killed me. And last year, when she made it clear she wanted to be with Hook, I was okay with that, because she’s my best friend first. Your grandparents are best friends, and they’re also in love. If you’re not friends the rest doesn’t work.”

“So you’re saying… friendship should be enough?”

“I’m saying if you really like this girl, if you think she’s funny and smart and you enjoy her company, then  _that’s_  what matters. Being a hero is about being selfless, and so is being part of someone else’s life. If she only wants to be friends, then you have to ask yourself if you like her enough for who she is to  _be_  her friend: to care about her happiness as much as your own. To know nothing more will happen, and know that just being a part of her life, making her smile, is enough for you. That’s how you know if it’s real. If it isn’t… well that’s okay, crushes are a normal part of life, and you can know it wasn’t anything serious and move on.”

“I do like her,” Henry insists. “I like it when she smiles, and I feel happier when I’m with her. And she is funny and smart, and I can talk to her, you know?”

“Then accept what she’s willing to give you, and let that make you happy. You’ll meet other girls: you’ll meet someone who wants to be with you, someday. And in the meantime, you’ll have gained a good friend. A good friend is far more valuable than a meaningless love affair.”

“So what do I do now?” Henry asks. “I… we kind of didn’t end it well.”

“You find her,” Neal tells him. “Tomorrow, she probably needs some space right now. You tell her you’re sorry for making her uncomfortable, that you think she’s great and you’re happy to just be friends, even knowing nothing else will happen. And you have to mean it – you’re just being manipulative if you don’t.”

“I do want to be her friend,” Henry says. “I really do.”

“Then tell her that, and ask her to do something tomorrow that she’ll enjoy and that clearly isn’t romantic. Then it’s up to her.”

“What if she says no?”

“Then she’s an idiot not to see what an amazing boy you are,” Neal says. “And you’re better off without someone who’d lie to you like that, friend or girlfriend.”

“Thanks dad,” Henry manages a smile, and hugs his father, who squeezes him back tight.  He stands to leave, but Neal stops him before he’s out the door.

“Hey, Henry?”

“Yeah, dad?”

“What did you mean about the song meaning something to you?”

Henry smiles, and looks at his feet, “I… ah… I used to spend a lot of time, wondering who my parents were,” he admits. “And I know I know you guys now, but it feels like there’re these whole different people who existed once, and I never got to know them. Where I came from. That song… it’s a piece of that time, you know?”

“Yeah, Henry,” Neal smiles, wistfully, because that song means the same to him too. “I know.”

“Anyway,” Henry smiles, “Goodnight, dad.”

“Night, Henry,” Neal waves goodbye, and Henry’s gone.

—

_Storybrooke_

“The Dark One has Excalibur?” Arthur demands, and David nods, gravely. Neal eyes Arthur a little warily, the other man’s eyes having taken on a worrying intensity, but says nothing.

“It’s back in the stone, though,” Neal says. “Locked up in her basement. We have no idea why so there’s no point asking.”

“Then we need to get it back at once,” Arthur says, frantically. “It would be disastrous if the Dark One took possession of it.”

“You know… we noticed something about your sword,” Neal says, a little hesitantly.  “It looks an awful lot like another blade: the Dark One’s dagger, to be precise. Any relation?

“How do you know about the dagger?” Arthur demands. Neal grins.

Something about Arthur nags at Neal, something that makes him sharp and untrusting, more like his father than he’d like. There’s just something off about Camelot’s king, and Neal can’t find the trust in him that everyone else can. But then, his father is missing and powerless, and his true love is the new Dark One, so Neal can’t imagine he’s the best judge of character right now.

“You know I said I was the son of a wizard?” Neal says, “Well, that was how my father got his powers. He was the last Dark One before Emma. So I’m guessing I know at least as much as you do, and probably a hell of a lot more. But still, in all that time, I never heard a word about Excalibur. You want to fill me in?”

“It’s not a long story,” Arthur tells them, but there’s a strange reluctance in his tone. “There’s a reason they resemble each other: they were forged as one weapon, and then broken in two. I spent years trying to reunite them.”

“That’s why you were so interested in the dagger when you arrived,” Mary Margaret surmises, and Neal is gratified to see she too has adopted defensive body language against the King. Maybe he’s not the only one getting an odd vibe from Arthur tonight.

“I apologise for not telling you sooner, but I had to be sure I could trust you,” Arthur replies, with that same intensity that sets Neal’s alarm bells ringing. That’s always a good excuse for withholding information, he thinks, and one his father used a hundred times when he was cursed. “The restored weapon has great power,” Arthur continues, “It can eradicate all dark magic, forever!”

“That’s a good thing,” David says, and Neal nods in agreement – a destruction of dark magic would destroy the Dark One, would save Emma. Would mean his father’s sacrifice was not for nothing.

“Of course!” Arthur agrees, “But in the wrong hands it could also destroy all light magic.”

Neal can’t stop a thin smile forming on his face: there’s always a catch.

“Well, that’d be Emma’s plan then,” he says. “Destroy all light magic, sounds like the sort of thing the Dark One would be into.”

“What happened in Camelot?” Snow asks, sounding utterly defeated, exhausted. “How did Emma fall so far?”

“She’s cursed,” Neal shrugs, a little pointedly. “Her motives aren’t her own, not entirely. In her mind, the Dark One has twisted what Emma wants to suit its own plans. If we didn’t manage to remove the Curse from her in Camelot, then this was only a matter of time.”

“You speak like they’re two entities,” Arthur argues. “But they’re one and the same!”

“You forget,” Neal rounds on him, “son of the last Dark One, and no, they’re not. My father, in his early days, he wasn’t at his worst yet. But there was a voice, someone only he could see. Whatever it was, it used to sit in my mother’s chair at the fire, and talk to my father through the night. It convinced him that murder and deception were justified by keeping us safe, by protecting the children. Good motivations, bad outcomes.”

“We’ll save Emma, Neal,” David assures him, but Neal notes how no mention is made of his father. “We’ll find a way to save her from this.”

“I hope so,” Neal nods. “I… yeah, I really hope so.”

—

_Camelot_

Neal has to run to the gathering in the woods. He was up late, helping Belle with her research, but she’s already there when he reaches Granny’s.

Merlin is not what he expects, not at all. Neal’s seen the old cartoon movie, heard legends: an old guy with a long white beard and pointy hat - Dumbledore but medieval. But this man is young, maybe younger than Neal himself, handsome and self-assured, no hat or long beard in sight.

“So, you’d be Merlin?” he asks, not wanting to assume anything, as he walks in and stands protectively at Emma’s side. Belle places a hand on his arm in greeting; Emma’s eyes are set on Merlin.

“Freshly restored from my arboreal nightmare, yes,” Merlin shoots him a quick, perfunctory smile. Neal makes a mental note to ask Belle later what ‘arboreal’ means.

“Great,” he says, “So you can help Emma? You can finally stop the Dark One?”

“Ah, Baelfire,” Merlin nods with recognition. “This is of particular interest to you, isn’t it, as both son and lover of a Dark One? Life’s dealt you a bad hand, hasn’t it?”

Neal nods, guarded, unsettled by the wizard’s omniscience. “This curse has torn my family apart,” he says, coldly. “If it can be destroyed, then yes, I’d like to see that happen sooner rather than later.”

“Very well,” Merlin nods. 

“You can do it, then?” Emma asks, “You can destroy it?”

Merlin considers, and then smiles. “Sure,” he says, casually, as if agreeing to pizza for dinner. “But,” he adds, sobering, “with a caveat.” He strides toward Emma, all youthfulness gone from his eyes, grave and careful. “Darkness like this, it takes hold of a person; finds its way deep inside, where nobody else can see. So if I am to free you from its grasp, I must know one thing. Emma: is your heart truly ready to be free? Because it is as much up to you as me.”

Emma pauses, staring into Merlin’s intense gaze, thinking about it. Neal shares a quick, anxious look with Belle, who looks back with sadness but no surprise. Of course, he thinks, this wouldn’t surprise her. She’s seen this before. She defeated the darkness with a kiss, only to have Rumpelstiltskin claw it back with both hands, and choose it over her. Time and again, his heart proved itself unwilling and unready to be free.

Emma does not answer, and Neal feels part of him break.

—

Henry’s in his room: sobbing into his mattress. Neal knows he’d rather no one know, so he leaves his son alone, and marches back down to Regina’s living room.

“Thank you for calling me, Regina,” he says, and for once he genuinely means his gratitude. “I can’t believe this happened.”

“I meant what I said today,” she replies, tersely. “He needs his father. He needs all the support he can get with Emma wandering around ripping teenagers’ hearts out. I can’t believe she’d do that to him,” Regina says, and for a moment she looks very young, wild-eyed and lost. “I… I really thought she was stronger than this.”

“No one is stronger than this,” Neal tells her, softly. “We were all fools to believe she could be.

“My mother…” Regina runs a hand through her hair, and Neal wonders where Robin is, why he isn’t here to comfort her. “My mother did almost the exact same thing to me. She ripped the heart out of my first love, and crushed it, to make me strong, to make me marry the king.

“Violet is fine,” Neal reminds her, stepping closer. He’s unsure of how to comfort someone he doesn’t really know, someone he’s never been a friend to. Someone he’s never understood and who, until very recently, he had little more than disdain for. “She’s safe, Emma didn’t hurt her permanently. And she and Henry had a good night together.”

Regina’s eyes are blazing when they meet his, but Neal knows the anger isn’t for him, not really, and he’s expecting it when she lashes out. “Now you’re defending her?” she demands, “You who were so uncomfortable today with even allowing him to distract her for an hour or two?”

“No,” he assures her, his voice simmering, furious. “No, I’m not. What she did was terrible, and you know that in the horrible parent issues race, we’re neck-a-neck. I know how awful it is to see your parent betray you that way. Your mom killed your first love so she could make you be Queen. My dad threw me into another realm, helpless and alone, so that he could remain an all-powerful demon. I know how this feels.”

“Your father came looking for you,” Regina retorts. “And he created my mother’s cruelty and mine to do it!”

“Your mother ripped out her own heart, and we both know it,” Neal reminds her, gently. “And… I’m sorry for what he did to you. I think he did equal numbers on the two of us. Abandonment and corruption, quite the team.”

“But he was the Dark One at the time,” Regina allows. “Like Emma is. He… he wouldn’t have hurt either of us the way he did otherwise, would he?”

“One day soon, Regina,” Neal says, genuinely, “I hope you can meet the man I remember. I think you deserve to a chance to know the truth.”

“I… I think that’d be weird,” Regina says. “Rumpelstiltskin and I… I don’t think you can put a name to it. And this is a very strange conversation to be having, especially with you.”

“Hey, in a weird way we’re both Rumpelstiltskin’s children,” Neal shrugs, with a little laugh. “Maybe we should form a support group.”

“Say that again and I’ll tear your throat out,” Regina snarls, but Neal can hear there’s no malice in it.

“I’m furious for what Emma did,” Neal promises. “Even more so because she did it before the darkness truly took hold. But you need to separate this from what happened to you. Emma knew she what she did was wrong, that’s why she hid it, and why Violet has her heart back. And Emma isn’t herself right now, anyway.”

“Can you separate it?” she challenges. “Can you look at those memories in that dream catcher and not see Rumpelstiltskin staring back at you?”

“That’s different,” he says, bleakly.

“Why?”

“Because the monster staring back at me is the exact same one that stole my childhood,” he shrugs. “Henry now faces that same horror, from the same source. That’s why I can’t talk to Emma right now,” he continues. “I can’t… I can’t look at her right now and not  _hate_  her, and my hatred helps no one.” 

He’s stunned when Regina purses her lips, and reaches out, placing one hand over his in solidarity, just for a second. “I’m sorry, Neal,” she says. “I’m sorry you lost them both.”

He smiles, and shakes his head, repeats what he said to Belle just days ago. “I haven’t lost anyone yet.”

She smiles, as if admiring his naiveté, and steps back. There’s a knock on the door, and the sound of Emma’s voice, “Regina! Open up!”

“I’ll get that,” Regina gestures to the door, and shoots Neal a quick smile – the first real, honest smile Neal thinks she’s ever given him. “I… thank you, Neal. I think I can almost see why Emma was so fond of you.”

Neal rolls his eyes, and heads for the hallway, “I’ll be on the stairs,” he tells her, “shout if you need back-up.”

Regina nods, tersely, and then straightens herself before answering Emma’s hammering on the door. Neal overhears their whole conversation – the accusations, the defence, Regina’s cutting tone. He can all but hear Emma flinch when she’s called Miss Swan, and once again Neal wonders at what happened between them before he came to Storybrooke. 

Regina’s friendship is important to Emma, but for once Neal can summon no sympathy for her at its loss. Not with Henry upstairs, crying over her betrayal.

Regina sounds far more composed now than she did a moment ago, and when she accuses Emma of manipulation, Neal wonders if she isn’t speaking for both of them. It’s an odd comfort to have Regina so firmly on his side, to know that in this, at least, they suffer the same fate, fight the same battle.

“Merlin?” Regina gasps, and Merlin sits up straighter, listens harder, trying to make out Emma’s flat, quiet tone. “We freed Merlin in Camelot?” Silence, guilty silence, and realisation dawns as Neal’s blood runs cold. Regina voices the very question that comes to his mind, “But if that’s true… then why are you still the Dark One?”

“We’re wasting time!” Emma cries, and Neal feels the evasion like a body blow. “I want to see my son!”

“Well, I don’t think he wants to see you,” Regina snaps back.  Neal fights the urge to run down there, to shout at her for himself, to shake Emma for answers and shake her for hurting Henry, to shake the darkness right out of her, the darkness that has lead her to be as terrible, as selfish as his own father became. For the first time, the very first, since all this began, Neal wonders if he truly has lost her.

“Goodbye, Miss Swan,” Regina spits, and whirls around, slamming the door in Emma’s face.

Neal comes down the stairs, and sees her breathing hard. “I won’t let her near Henry again,” she vows, her voice shaking. “Not until all of this is over. She’s gone too far this time.”

Neal nods, heavily. “For once, Regina, we agree.”


	7. The Bear and the Bow

“We found Merlin back in Camelot?” Mary Margaret gasps, and Regina nods, grimly.

“Emma let it slip last night, when she tried to visit Henry.”

“And yet Emma’s still the Dark One,” Neal adds, and Regina nods.

“Which means something went awry,” she agrees, “Emma wouldn’t say what. Which is why we’re going to ask the man himself,” she pulls a large red toadstool out from behind her back.

“The crimson crown,” David recognises the mushroom with a smile. “You’ve figured out how to make the communication spell work!”

“So you want to use a… magic mushroom to talk to a wizard?” Neal raises an eyebrow and leans back, folding his arms. “Does he live with Puff the Magic Dragon?” he snickers at his own joke; no one else is amused. “What? No one finds this even a little bit funny? I miss Emma, sometimes it’s too easy to tell none of you have ever left Storybrooke.”

Regina shoots him a dismissive glare, but his smile only broadens. “Let’s just say that watching Emma rip Violet’s heart from her chest gave me all the motivation I need.”

“So… what, we look up Merlin’s area code and dial? Do we have to smoke something first?”

“You’re not funny,” Regina snaps, “And it’s not that simple, anyway. Not just anyone can summon Merlin. He’ll only appear to someone who’s been chosen by him.”

David’s face is pensive as he eyes the mushroom, “Arthur,” he says. “Merlin delivered all the prophecies to him.”

Regina nods, “So what do you say, Sheriff?”

“I’m already on my way,” David has his hands on his hips, his man-of-action hero pose. Neal resists the urge to roll his eyes.

Belle steps forward, and Neal can’t hold back a small smile at the determination on her face. “Wait, wait!” she calls, halting both David and Regina, holding up her hand as she steps into the centre of their little semicircle. “Why are we wasting our time with Merlin when there’s someone here who can help us?”

“Who?” Mary Margaret looks around in confusion, and Neal resists the urge to bang his head against a wall.

It’s only been a day since they found the ropes in Emma’s basement, but anxiety has gnawed at his stomach ever since, thinking of his father lost and alone out there somewhere. He and Belle are on the same page, he knows: they have to find him, and soon.

“Rumple!” Belle explains, as frustrated as Neal feels. David and Mary Margaret are looking at her like she’s lost her mind, but Regina’s looking thoughtful.

“But didn’t he cause all of this?” David demands. “By coming back here after you sent him out of town? If he’d just stayed in New York-“

“Then he’d be dead by now!” Neal objects. “And we don’t know that the Dark One wouldn’t have possessed him even there when he died, and gone on a rampage through Manhattan. He did what he had to do, and people who throw babies through portals shouldn’t throw stones.”

Everyone stares at him: Belle in stunned admiration, everyone else with horror.

Neal’s frustration is at breaking point, but he knows realistically that David and Mary Margaret are as frightened for Emma as he is. Their tunnel-vision, however, their willingness to throw his father under the bus in their haste save their daughter? That’s starting to grate on his already frayed nerves.

Regina is silent on the subject: Neal thinks back to their conversation the night before, and wonders if she hasn’t thought a little since on their shared relationship to his father.

“Which is exactly my point,” Belle agrees. “What we’re facing is as much Emma’s fault as Rumple’s: she was seduced by the darkness the same as he was! He did some terrible things, but we’re seeing now that she’s capable of exactly the same. So how does that make Rumple any different?”

“He’s out there right now, alone, at Emma’s mercy,” Neal adds. “He knows more about this curse than anyone, and about what it’s like to be trapped under it. If anyone can help Emma it’s him.”

“I’m sorry,” David shakes his head, “But we have to give Emma her best chance. Which means contacting Merlin.”

Tunnel vision. Neal resists the urge to slam his fist into David’s face, and Belle looks no less angry.

“And if something bad happens to Rumple?” Belle demands, glaring at them all. Regina looks uncomfortable.

“Right now… maybe that’s a risk we have to take. I don’t like it any more than you do, but we don’t even know how to find him. If we can save Emma, then Gold will be safe too.”

“If it were the other way around, you’d be storming off to save Emma and damn my father,” Neal retorts, disappointed in her. “If he had held her captive last year… well, we all know how that would have ended.”

“She’s our daughter,” David pleads. “She has to be our priority. I’m sorry but… we’re going to have to risk it.”

“Well, you might be okay with that,” Belle spits, “But I’m not!”

She charges off out of the door without another word, Neal hot on her heels. “That was pretty badass,” he praises her, and sees she’s breathing hard with adrenaline and exertion.

“Well,” she says, marching down the corridors, her heels clacking on the smooth marble surface, “Enough is enough. I care about Emma, and the town, but Rumple deserves someone in his corner too. They’ll function just fine without me for a day or two.”

“Without  _us_ ,” Neal corrects. “You’re not alone in this. Whatever you want to do, I’m right there with you.”

“Thank you, Bae,” Belle smiles a little as they break through the doors and out into the wintry sunlight. “But we need a plan.”

“Way ahead of you,” Neal grins, stopping her at the foot of the stairs. “It’s pretty obvious, really.”

“Well?” she asks, and he winks at her.

“Sorry, just enjoying the feeling of having worked something out before you,” he teases, and she rolls her eyes in frustration.

“You’re going to suggest that I go to the library and start working on a location spell, or trying to find clues as to where he might be being kept, while you go confront Emma directly?” she guesses, correctly. “I take my former lover, you take yours?”

Neal rolls his eyes, his shoulders sagging, “Oh, come on, you could have let me have my moment.”

Belle allows herself a smug smile, “You’re a lot like your father, you know,” she replies. “You _have_  to have your big  _moment_.” She does a little flourish, like his father used to, and Neal winces.

“Now you’re just being mean,” he accuses, and she grins at him.

“It’s a good plan, well done,” she praises. “Do you have your cell phone on?”

“Always,” Neal draws it out of his pocket to show her. “So call me the moment you find anything.”

“You be careful,” she warns. “Rumple’s not going to be any better off for you getting yourself hurt.”

“Emma won’t hurt me,” Neal tells her. “You of all people know that. The Dark One can do terrible things, but they stop short of directly hurting the people they love. And she does love me.”

“Watch out for sleeping spells, then,” Belle mutters, darkly. “That was Rumple’s trick, once he’d gone off the rails. The amount of times I’ve woken up with no memory of falling asleep…”

“Duly noted,” Neal nods, and starts off in the direction of the forest. Then a thought occurs, and he turns on his heel, calling out, “Hey, Belle?”

She turns back to him, curious. “What?”

“You’re… kind of amazing, you know?” he says, a little awkwardly. “All the shit he put you through, you’re still trying to help him.”

“Weren’t you the one telling me how different he was before the curse, and how I should be more forgiving?” she asks, an eyebrow raised.

“Trying to wake him up and defending him in front of the hero squad are two very different things,” Neal reminds her. “As is storming off to his rescue now it’s gotten potentially dangerous.” Belle looks a little uncomfortable for a moment, and then brushes it off, all action.

“We need to get moving,” she says. “Call me if you find anything!”

She charges off toward the library, faster and more purposeful than she has any right to be in those heels, and Neal watches her leave with a small frown. He hopes that, if she finds his father first, she’s ready for the man she’ll see then. The man who will be very, very pleased to see her, and hurt by any ambivalence she shows in feeling the same.

—

Regina’s house is relatively close to the woods, but Neal still wonders again about finding himself a new car. The walk feels interminable, like his feet can’t move fast enough, but Emma won’t have been keeping Rumpelstiltskin locked up in town. He doesn’t want to confront her directly if he doesn’t have to, and if he can find his father without having to speak to her they’ll all be better off.

Still, he wonders the woods for a few hours before he has any bright ideas. He checks the cabin first, but it’s deserted. One of Cruella’s coats hangs on the hook by the door, and it’s an oddly melancholy reminder of another time: a time when Neal’s father was the villain of the piece and not its victim. Or maybe he always was the victim; maybe it’s all a matter of perspective.

It’s getting to mid-afternoon when he leaves the cabin, and Neal’s stomach begins to growl. He starts to realise that he has no chance of finding his father by luck alone, but after pausing to think for a minute he figures the mines are a good bet. If she’s been transporting things without being seen, and not using magic for every movement, then the basement in her home likely connects to the tunnels.

Neal almost smiles when, less than a few hundred feet from the tree line around the mines, he sees signs of human inhabitants. No one camps out here, not even the Merry Men, and the site is small. Bingo.

Unfortunately, there’s no one around, no sign of his father hidden anywhere in the campsite. His heart sinks: time for plan B, then.

“Well, here goes nothing,” he murmurs to himself, then takes a deep breath, and speaks loud and clear. “Emma Swan, Emma Swan, Emma Swan!”

“Hey, Neal,” her voice comes from behind him, slow and measured, and he turns to watch her warily. “What’re you doing so far from town?”

“Looking for the other family member of mine you’re psychologically scarring these days,” he tells her, without preamble or evasion. “You kidnapped my father, I need to know where he is and why he’s there.”

“Oh, but, I don’t know where he is,” Emma’s eyes widen with faux-innocence, as she steps closer. “He escaped captivity earlier this morning. I’d assume if he has any sense he’s far from here by now.”

“He escaped?” Neal asks, disbelievingly. “My old, crippled  father escaped the Dark One? I don’t buy that. Why’d you let him go?”

“He ran of his own accord,” Emma insists, and then points behind him. “Take a look. He made a pretty noble sacrifice to achieve it.”

Neal turns, doubtfully, trying to keep one eye on Emma as he inches toward the place she indicated. A threadbare, makeshift tent sits before a small campfire, and Neal’s heart gives a tug at the misery his poor, disabled father must have endured being trapped living out here in the autumn Maine chill. There’s something scattered on the ground: broken pieces, white ceramic. Neal gasps.

“You asshole,” he mutters. “You made him break the teacup?”

He crouches to the ground, stunned and furious, and gathers the pieces as gently as he can. Maybe they can fix it, he thinks desperately, or at least save the pieces someplace safe. The cup means a great deal to both Belle and Rumpelstiltskin: to break it feels like a terrible sin.

“The cup was nothing to do with me,” Emma denies, suddenly right beside him as Neal straightens to stare her down. “A friend of mine decided to bring that out here as… motivation. Turns out Gold values his freedom more than some trinket.”

“You wore that swan pendant for a decade, Emma,” he spits in her face, “And Graham’s shoelace, and you keep your baby blanket close at hand. You value mementos like that, so how would you feel if someone had made you burn them to stay alive?”

“I never forced his hand,” she stipulates, and Neal’s blood runs cold: she sounds exactly like his father in his worst moments.

“I beg to differ,” he snaps. “And I think you’re going to really regret this when you wake up and realise the damage you’re doing. Where is he?”

“Where do you think?” Emma’s asks, an infuriatingly smug smile forming on her red lips. “Where would he run for help and solace when the big bad wolf is chasing him?”

Neal’s eyes widen with horror when realisation dawns, “You’re going after Belle,” he gasps. “What the  _hell_  is wrong with you?”

“I need a hero,” Emma shrugs. “Specifically, that one. He’ll be fine, Neal, he’ll get his act together and do what needs to be done. He always has.”

“You don’t know him,” Neal stammers, “Emma, you don’t know who he was, before all this. He’s scared, and broken, and he’s only got one good leg. He’ll run and for good reason, and you’ll end up killing someone who’s never done anything to hurt you.”

“That’s interesting,” Emma frowns, mockingly. “I’d have thought your existence is evidence to the contrary. When people he loves are threatened, he can do incredible things. Self-mutilation, arson, stabbing all-powerful demons… ring any bells?”

“Then why not choose me?” he demands, “Why not send whatever pet monster you have after me? I’m the one he did those things for.”

Emma’s pulled up short by that, and just watches him, eye to eye, willing him to understand. Neal stares at her, dumbfounded. “You couldn’t do it, could you?” he marvels. “You couldn’t risk hurting me. What, is it Henry? Are you scared he’d hate you if you killed his father? Or is it more than that?”

“How I feel is irrelevant,” she snaps. “What matters is that your scared little father becomes a hero.”

“Don’t make him,” Neal begs. “Please, Emma, don’t do this to him, he’s been through enough.”

“You’ll understand, eventually,” she says, and there’s an odd pleading note in her voice and in her eyes that astounds him: she really believes that. She believes he can just shrug his shoulders and let her do what seems necessary. She’s fallen so far, he thinks, that she can’t even see the light anymore.

“I understand that you’re doing what you think you have to,” he starts, carefully. “But this is the curse talking, not you. The Emma I know would never torture an innocent man, much less threaten his wife, not for _anything_.”

“This  _is_  me, Neal,” she says, and for the first time since he summoned her he almost recognises her. That lost girl, desperate for acceptance, is still in there, but a thick layer of dark power and compulsion all but hides her from view. “I know you’re mad. I know you overheard what happened last night at Regina’s house…”

“You’re damn right I did,” Neal agrees. “And I saw what happened in the dream catcher, she showed me. And before you try to justify it, let me say that you can’t pull that shit again. You can’t hurt Henry, not for any reason. I get it, okay? I get that this curse has driven you out of your goddamn mind, and I’ve been in this position before, so if I can forgive my father I can forgive you. But I need you to draw a line somewhere, and I need that line to at least be the point where you hurt our son in cold blood.”

“Henry is fine, and so is Violet,” Emma insists, echoing Neal’s own reassurances the night before. He shakes his head.

“Henry just got exposed to the same monster that ruined my childhood,” he retorts. “It’s not okay. And he’s a strong kid; he’s better than any of us. He doesn’t hate you.”

“Do  _you_  hate me, Neal?” Emma asks, simply. Neal thinks for a moment, and shakes his head.

“I don’t think could never hate you, Emma,” he sighs. “But… if my family aren’t alive and well at the end of the day, that answer might change.”

She looks as if she’s about to say something, but he shakes his head. “I’m off to rescue my father,” he tells her, his teeth gritted. “And if anything comes after Belle, I’ll be standing in the way, and you can explain to Henry what his dad died for.”

He sprints off, shoving the shards of the chipped teacup in his coat pocket as he goes, back toward town. His phone is in his hand, and the moment he has cell service, he dials Belle’s number.

“Hey,” Belle says, breathlessly. “I tried to call you a hundred times, where are you?”

“I found Emma’s little bootcamp,” he pants, running as hard as he can back to town through the trees. “Papa escaped: he’s coming to find you, and she’s sending something after you, something bad. She thinks she can-“

“Turn him into a hero, yes, I know,” Belle says. “I have him here now, he… he found me, Bae.” Her voice is clogged, and he wonders where his father is right now, because he can’t see her crying in front of him right now. “And Emma’s special surprise already found us,” she continues. “A Scottish girl called Merida, armed with a bow and arrow.”

“Are you both okay?” Neal demands, alarmed, his heart racing in his chest: the thought of his father and stepmother on the receiving end of an arrow is terrifying.

“Yes, yes,” Belle assures him. “I knocked her out, but Rumple’s terrified. I’m really worried, Neal, I don’t know what he’s going to do. He’s… he’s not how I ever remember him.”

“Can you put him on the phone?” Neal asks, grateful when, at last, the outskirts start to come into view. He slows to a jog, unable to keep the sprint up, and hears jostling on the other end.

Then a voice, desperate and breathless and achingly familiar, halts him in his tracks. “Bae?”

He takes a deep breath, his heart clenching and a knot unfurling in his stomach. “Yeah, papa, it’s me,” he breathes, and hears a soft sound on the other end.

“Oh, my boy,” his father all but weeps, “I’m so glad to hear your voice.”

“Likewise, papa,” Neal agrees, unable to keep a relieved smile from his face. “Are you alright?”

“Emma’s goon is after us, so… we’re going someplace safe.” Rumpelstiltskin sounds as scared as Belle said, and Neal is as worried as she is: bad things happen when his father gets panicky. “I can’t be the hero she wants, Bae, I just… you know me, son. I  _can’t_.”

“I beg to differ, but let me help,” he says. “Emma just said she won’t hurt me: I can help keep you safe until we figure this out.”

“Yes,” Rumpelstiltskin breathes, urgency deepening his voice, “Yes, you have to come too. Where are you, son? We’ll come pick you up.”

“I’m just reaching the end of Plum now.”

“Good, good,” Rumpelstiltskin replies, “all right, we’ll meet you outside Granny’s in ten minutes.”

“I’ll see you soon, papa,” Neal says, and hears his father sigh.

“As soon as we can, son,” Rumpelstiltskin replies, and Neal hangs up.

Someplace safe? Neal’s mind is whirring as he crosses Plum and heads onto Maple, Main Street coming into view at the end of the block. Did he meant he cabin in the woods? That’s the only place in town Neal can think of where his father might feel remotely safe, and even then…

The only other option is over the Town Line, and there’s no way he could be that stupid. Belle knows, everyone knows, what happens to people who cross. Dopey is still trapped on the other side as an elm tree, and even if Belle hasn’t told him that, Rumpelstiltskin isn’t stupid: he has to know Emma would seal them in.

He can’t be that reckless, but then Neal remembers the burning castle, the knife and the Dark One in the forest at night. Rumpelstiltskin can be  _exactly_  that reckless when terrified.

Those worries are forgotten, however, when he sees the familiar black Cadillac come into view and pull up along side him. Belle is out of the car in a moment, hugging him close and knocking the breath from him, and Neal hugs her back, feeling her trembling. “Are you okay?” he whispers; she nods.

“He’s so different,” she whispers back. “It’s all… a lot to take.”

“Bae,” Rumpelstiltskin has limped from the car, and stands on Belle’s other side. Neal releases her, and gladly draws his father into a fierce hug: their first hug since the curse stole Rumpelstiltskin’s soul away.

“Papa,” he sighs, and Rumpelstiltskin holds him so close he thinks his ribs might break, his face buried in Neal’s shoulder, shaking as hard as Belle was. “Papa, it’s okay,” he soothes. “We’re all together now, it’ll be okay.”

“Thank you, son.” Rumpelstiltskin’s voice is trembling as he pulls away, fumbling with his cane as he looks ready to openly weep, his hand cradling his son’s cheek. “I… I heard your voice, when I was out, even when I… when I wanted to let go. I heard you defending me; standing beside me. Even after everything I did to you, you stayed. Thank you, my boy. Thank you.”

“I love you, papa,” he replies, knowing it’s what his father needs to hear. “You fight for what you love.”

Rumpelstiltskin smiles, tearfully. “My brave boy,” he murmurs, and Neal hugs him closer.

“What now?” Belle asks, after another moment. “Merida won’t be out for long.”

“We should grab some food,” Neal reminds them, Belle in particular. “I’m starved, and skipping meals is bad.”

Rumpelstiltskin shoots him an odd smile, and then glances to Belle, who shifts a little uncomfortably, her eyes defiant under their shared scrutiny. He watches his father take in the newly sharpened lines of her jaw and throat, her cheekbones no longer rounded, her shoulders slender. Her whole body is smaller and thinner, stress and sleepless nights having taken their toll. Rumpelstiltskin sighs.

“Yes,” he agrees. “Perhaps we’ll be safe in public. Emma won’t want to risk an open confrontation, where someone other than me could fight back.”

“Hide out in the diner, then?” Neal suggests. “Granny’s got her crossbow, so we should be safe for an hour or two, while we work out what to do next.”

“I know what to do next,” Rumpelstiltskin replies, grimly.

“Never the less,” Belle says, warningly, “Time to think and formulate a plan isn’t a bad idea.”

She leads the way into Granny’s, and Neal has to admit he feels a little safer inside, away from the open street. Granny won’t allow any bloodshed on her watch, and she’s fond of Belle: they’ll be safe here for a few hours, at least.

Belle barely eats, but it’s Rumpelstiltskin who speaks up. “I, ah, I hope you’re not starving yourself on my account, sweetheart.”

Belle looks up from her contemplation of her ham salad sandwich, and frowns. “Oh, no,” she denies, with a false laugh. “I just ate a lot for breakfast.”

“It’s four pm,” Neal reminds her. “Breakfast was a long time ago.”

She glares at him, and shakes her head, “It’s hard to have an appetite when you were nearly killed only a few hours ago. The adrenaline, you know?”

“And the memory of your so-called protector cowering and forcing you to save yourself,” Rumpelstiltskin mutters, bitterly, his face twisted with self-loathing. “I quite understand.”

“Rumple,” Belle reaches out a hand over the table and touches his forearm, smiling that reassuring smile. “It’s okay, we made it out safe and sound. I don’t need anyone standing in front of arrows for me. I’m not upset about that.”

“The arrow was metaphorically meant for me,” Rumpelstiltskin reminds her. “I’m the one putting you in danger.”

“You’ll handle it,” she smiles, full of confidence, full of love Neal isn’t sure she’s aware she’s showing, much less would admit to. “I know you, Rumple, I see what you can do, and I know you can do this. I know you can save us.”

Rumpelstiltskin nods, taking a bite of his burger, the food preventing him from replying.

“If anyone can defeat a Dark One papa, it’s you,” Neal adds, trying to bolster his confidence. Rumpelstiltskin’s eyes are uneasy, but his smile is genuine as he looks at his son.

“I’m sorry that my awakening put the two of you in danger again,” Rumpelstiltskin sighs. “I bring neither of you anything but trouble. You deserve so much more than this.”

“Hey, I’m safe as houses,” Neal forces a careless grin. “Perks of being the Dark One’s baby-daddy, you know.”

“That’s somehow the most crass phrasing I’ve ever heard,” Rumpelstiltskin grimaces. “And I was in the  _army_.”

“I have a gift,” Neal grins, and wraps an arm around his father’s shoulders, hugging him even as he tries to eat his bacon sandwich with one hand. “My aim is to have taught Henry every bad word and dirty joke I know by the time Emma comes back to herself to stop me. With Regina playing nice these days, someone has to be a bad influence.”

“Henry’s mother is the  _Dark One_ ,” Belle points out, her eyes narrowed. “How are you going to be a  _worse_  influence?”

“We’re keeping Henry away from her, for the time being,” Neal shrugs. “After the whole Violet thing.”

“Wait, who’s Violet?” Belle asks, confused. Neal returns to using two hands to shove his food in his mouth – stress, apparently, makes him hungry. He thinks he knew that, but he’s still surprised by how ravenous he is.

“Henry’s girlfriend,” he mumbles around a mouthful of bacon-y goodness.

“Young Henry has a girlfriend?” Rumpelstiltskin asks, frowning. Neal nods.

“Oh, shit, yeah I never told you about that. Okay, so it turns out in Camelot, Henry got super close to this girl called Violet. He had a crush and she liked him, too, but then Emma ripped her heart out so she would break  _his_  heart. Something about using his tears to free Merlin?”

“They freed the  _Sorcerer_?” Rumpelstiltskin demands.

Neal nods, “That’s not really the point, though. The rest of the hero squad are tracking that down. We decided our time was better spent,” he grins pointedly at his father, who smiles, mystified.

“So Emma truly has embraced her darkness,” Rumpelstiltskin murmurs, sadly, looking down at his hands. “I dearly hoped Henry would be spared the collateral. I… well, you of all people know how much damage the Dark One can do to a child.”

“Yeah,” Neal grimaces. “Hence keeping her away from him, for the time being. He’s taking it like a trooper, though. He’s a lot kinder and more understanding than I ever was at his age.”

“He’s doing okay?” Belle checks, sympathetically. Neal nods, and she smiles, “I’m glad.”

“You shouldn’t have  _had_  to be understanding,” Rumpelstiltskin shakes his head. “Neither should Henry. It’s never the child’s place to be the adult in the relationship.”

“Papa, this is old ground,” Neal sighs. “It’s in the past, and Henry has a lot more outside support than I did. It’s going to be okay.”

“I’m sorry, son,” Rumpelstiltskin says. Neal doesn’t ask for what.

—

The sun is setting when they get back into the Cadillac, but it’s properly dark by the time either Belle or Neal asks the question. Neal already has a creeping suspicion he knows exactly what his father’s plan is. They start to recognise trees and landmarks, and Neal’s stomach rolls.

“Where are we going?” Belle demands. 

“The only place we’ll be safe from Emma and her quivered friend,” Rumpelstiltskin replies, his eyes still on the road.

Belle puts the pieces together at the same time as Neal, “You’re taking us out of Storybrooke!” she cries with dismay.

She’s furious, Neal can see that, but his father is so desperate to rescue them all that he continues to try to justify it. Neal’s anger builds too: if they leave, he may never see Henry again, and he can’t believe his father thinks he’d be okay with that. They’re trapped with him in the car, and if they cross the line then who knows if they can come back?

“Papa, no!” he cries, “You can’t do this!”

“This pouch has transformation powder,” he explains. “It’ll keep us safe from any ill-effects from crossing the town line.”

“No, no!” Belle says, “We can’t leave, not while there’re still people we care about in this town.”

“Yeah, what about Henry?” Neal demands, “And Emma, for that matter? Do you expect me to turn my back on my family to save ours? Papa, how can you do this?”

“I’m sorry, Bae,” Rumpelstiltskin says, helplessly. “But it’s the only way I can keep the two of you safe from her. I can’t lose you again, I just  _can’t_!”

“We can’t leave Emma alone with the curse, or Henry with her!”

“Bae, I used to be the Dark One,” Rumpelstiltskin reminds him, as if he could ever forget. “I know Emma better than she knows herself. She will keep coming until she gets what she wants.”

“Well we’ll stop her!” Belle declares. “Together!”

“Didn’t you see what happened back there?” Rumpelstiltskin asks her, and Neal, worries at the helpless fear in his father’s voice, which never leads anywhere good. “I couldn’t even protect you from Merida!”

Belle’s eyeing him, recognising the same thing Neal has: his father cannot be reasoned with. “Papa, I need you to stop the car,” he says.

“Bae, please-“

“Rumple, stop the car right now,” Belle insists, her hand on the door handle.

“What? No!”

“Now!” Belle shouts, but Rumpelstiltskin keeps his eyes on the road, and if anything increases their speed: they’re apparently leaving whether they like it or not. Resentment, cold and hard and ancient, settles in Neal’s stomach. He’d so hoped his father had changed.

Belle starts wrestling with the door handle, apparently willing to jump from the car if she has to, and Rumpelstiltskin gapes at her, panicked. He slams on the breaks, and the moment they’re stopped  Belle leaps from the car as if she can’t stand to be near him anymore.

Neal follows, watching her closely, hoping there’s a way they can do this without hurting anyone and knowing from experience that there isn’t. She’s already walking away, marching, without waiting for a discussion or an explanation.

“Papa,” he begs. “Please, you have to see what a terrible idea this is.”

“I have to protect you,” Rumpelstiltskin pleads, “please, Bae. Get back in the car, eh? Let me keep you safe for once.”

“My son is here, papa!” Neal cries. “I can’t just leave him – could you just leave me? I have to stay here for him. You can’t make me leave him behind!”

Belle has already started back toward town, without a backward glance. Rumpelstiltskin sees her retreating back and starts toward her, “Belle! Belle! Come on, what are you doing? Come back in the car!”

She whirls to face him, angrier than Neal and unafraid to show it.

“No,” she says, and then starts to leave again, only to turn back, to point at him, to give him a piece of her mind. Neal remembers how angry she was, how hurt when Rumpelstiltskin lied to her last year, when she’d trusted and believed in him and he’d broke her trust so completely. They’re back at the town line now, they’re back where they were then, and once again he has deceived her, once again he’s taken her choice away. Neal doesn’t try to stop her; he doesn’t think that he could.

Neal expects this from his father, is used to it, and can understand how afraid Rumpelstiltskin has to be do to attempt this. But Neal isn’t expected to be in love with him, or build a life with him. His stake in this is is smaller, somehow.

“No,” Belle cries, “You know what? Running never made anyone a hero!”

“Belle, come on,” Neal interjects, standing between them, between his father and his furious true love. “He never claimed to be a hero.”

“But he could be,” Belle replies, her eyes on Rumpelstiltskin, never once looking at Neal “If he’d just  _try_  for once! But no, no it’s better to lie and to run than to face up to your fear. Better to hate yourself than to stand up.”

“I’m sorry, Belle,” Rumpelstiltskin pleads. “But Bae’s right: I never pretended to be a hero. I’m not one, and I never will be.”

“You’ve been brave before,” Belle challenges. Rumpelstiltskin scoffs.

“When? During the first Ogres War?”

Belle stops, because yes, that is what she’s thinking of, and Bae’s heart sinks: he knows what comes next. He knows the next lie his father will tell, and this one so old Rumpelstiltskin himself believes it. “Let me tell you the truth about that day,” he says, and his eyes slide to Bae, who meets his terrified gaze with acceptance, with honesty. He’s heard this one before, from the mouths of villagers and soldiers and his own mother, and never once has he believed it for a second. “I didn’t cripple myself to return to you, Bae,” he says, softly, shakily. “I did it… because I was scared.”

“Rumple…” Belle starts, coming toward them, standing in front of Rumpelstiltskin, and Bae steps back, unable to hear another word.

“You’re lying now, papa,” he says. “That isn’t what happened, and you know it.”

“How would you know?” Rumpelstiltskin sighs, “All your life, have I ever proven more than a coward? I joined the army to prove myself, but when I saw the wounded coming back from the front… I didn’t want to die.”

“Because you had a family,” Neal reminds him. “Because the ogres were unstoppable, a force of nature. Emma and Merida are just people, papa. They can be stopped. This isn’t the same thing.”

“I’m a coward, Bae,” he reiterates. “I always have been. That won’t change. Please, get back in the car: this is the only way I know how to protect you both. Come on, eh? Let’s go,  _please_.”

Belle sighs, and takes his hands in hers, and for a moment Bae hopes one of them might relent, for all he wouldn’t get back in that car for the world. His father needs Belle to trust him, to love him, and he’ll be broken to pieces if she can’t.

Then she pulls back, shaking her head. “Protect yourself, you mean,” she accuses, with a sigh, and Neal knows that she’s remembering the last time they were here, the lies and the deceit, the things his father’s fear forced him to do. He was cursed then, but he has no such excuse now. He’ll never be someone she can trust until he masters this crippling fear, and Rumpelstiltskin watches her leave with an expression that says he knows that, but can’t believe things will ever change. “Belle?” he calls, helplessly, “Belle, please! Bae?” he turns, his voice wavering. “Please, not you too.”

“I have to stay with Henry, papa,” he pleads. “I don’t want to leave you, I really don’t, but I have to be with him. And you don’t have to go.”

“I can’t… Bae, if I stay Emma will just keep coming for Belle. I can’t keep putting her in danger, she… she deserves to be safe from me, at last.”

“Maybe she was right,” he murmurs. “Maybe… maybe this is about you. You’d just leave me behind?”

“No, Bae!” Rumpelstiltskin shakes his head, “I don’t, I love you. I don’t want to leave you! But… you have to remember the last time we couldn’t run, when I stood and fought for you?”

“Yes, I do,” Neal nods. “And it’s not the time you’re thinking of. You  _died_  for me, papa. You stood in front of the demon that destroyed us both and you killed him for me, and for Belle. You were so brave that day… and then we resurrected you, and I’m sorry for what came after that. But we love you enough that  we need you with us. Don’t leave us now.”

“I have to,” Rumpelstiltskin says, “Bae, I have to. I can’t let Belle die, and I can’t protect her.”

“And I can’t leave Emma alone with the curse. I can’t leave Henry behind. So this… this is goodbye,” Neal swallows, hard and clasps his father’s forearm. “But I hope you change your mind.”

He turns, and walks away without another word, his hand shaking but his spine straight, resolute. He hears his father calling, begging him to turn around, and his hands shake, but Rumpelstiltskin forced this choice. If he’s asking Neal to choose between his father and his son, then Neal has to choose Henry. It’s the same choice Rumpelstiltskin has always made for him.

Belle’s right: none of them will be safe if Rumpelstiltskin keeps running away, if he can’t even stand up when he knows he’s their only hope. With every step, he hopes to hear the car pull up behind him, his father returning, but there’s only silence.

Like the portal, like the first time: Rumpelstiltskin was afraid, begging, holding on and then… and then he let go.

Neal swallows hard around the childish knot in his throat, and when he rounds the bend in the road he catches up with Belle. “You left too?” she asks, sadly, and Neal realises she’d assumed he’d at least stay behind.

“I had to,” Neal says, “I have to be with Henry, I have to save Emma. I don’t… you can’t be choosing those careless people over him, Belle. I know you.”

“Do you… hate me, then, Neal?” Belle asks, as they walk, and it’s so similar to what Emma said that morning that Neal starts for a second.

“No, of course not, I… I get it, I do. You have to be with someone you can trust, to build a life together. If he can’t be that person then maybe it’s better you’re not together.”

“I can’t believe he left without you,” she sighs. “I just… I can’t believe it. After all he did to find you.”

“He’s scared,” Neal shrugs. “And he wants you to be safe. He figures if he’s gone, there’s no reason to hurt you. He chose your life over being with me. That’s pretty huge.”

“That’s still not a brave decision,” Belle shakes her head. “Abandoning all we could have had because he’s too scared to fight for it.”

“He’s already sacrificed for his freedom once today,” Neal tells her, and pulls the shattered pieces of the teacup from his pocket. Belle stops and stares, taking them in her slim hands.

“He broke it?” she gasps, “Why?”

“To cut through the ropes, I assume,” Neal shrugs. “Your teacup saved him.”

“But he still can’t stick around to save me,” she murmurs, a sad smile on her face. “Maybe… maybe it wasn’t meant to be, after all.”

“I think you’re wrong,” Neal says, resolutely. “Who knows? Maybe he’ll realise what he’s lost and turn around, come back to us. Maybe he’ll find a way home: he did last time.”

“There shouldn’t  _be_  a ‘last time’,” Belle mutters.

“Last time was your decision,” Neal reminds her. “You threw him over the line and didn’t even ask me.”

“You saw him just then, Neal!” Belle cries. “He all but kidnapped us because he knew we wouldn’t leave if given the choice! You expect me to trust a man who’d do that, even without a curse?”

“No,” Neal sighs, “I’m just-“

There’s someone blocking the road. Red hair, blue dress, bow and arrow: Merida.

“You should have followed your wee sweetheart over the town line,” she says to Belle. Belle takes a deep breath.

“Okay,” she murmurs, processing this, before raising a hand, trying to calm the homicidal archer before them. “Look, he’s not my sweetheart, and I’m not scared of you.”

“He’s gone, now, anyway,” Neal adds. “He’s left town! Surely there’s no reason to hurt Belle anymore.”

“You  _should_  be scared,” Merida tells Belle, ignoring Neal. “Now the Dark One isn’t taking any chances. She’s making me drink this,” she holds up a little glass bottle full of black liquid, and Belle stares at it.

“What is that?” Neal demands, stepping between Merida and Belle. “I know Emma won’t hurt me, so answer me! What the hell is that potion?”

“Aye, you’re right,” Merida’s eyes flash to his. “Dark One told me  _specifically_  not to let you get killed, and said you might try to interfere.”

“So?”

“So she armed me with this,” she digs in her back, and comes out with a small twist of paper. She walks up to Neal, who stands his ground, and she smiles, “Oh, you’re braver than your wee father, aren’t you?” she says. “Pity you won’t see my next trick.”

She holds up the paper and opens it, revealing a pile of blue powder. She blows it into Neal’s face, and he feels the world retreating and contracting around him, darkness slipping in.

“No,” he tries to shout, but it comes out as a murmur as his whole head goes numb, and then he’s falling, falling, down into oblivion.

—

When Neal awakens, there’s something soft underneath him, something that definitely isn’t a road. He blinks his eyes open, and with a sinking heart recognises his surroundings: Emma’s underground lair. Wonderful.

“Sleeping beauty awakens,” Emma drawls, leaning on the stone with the sword lodged in it. “I was wondering if you were ever going to come to.”

“Why the hell am I here?” he demands, scrambling to sit up, his head still spinning, his eyes unfocused. “Where’s Belle?”

“She’s just fine,” Emma smiles, smugly. “Your father fought a bear to save her. Pretty heroic, wouldn’t you say?”

“A  _bear_?” Neal ciries, confused, trying to work out how that’s possible. “Is…” he swallows hard, “is my papa okay?”

“They’re both completely in tact,” Emma tells him. “He pulled some last minute magic out of the bag before I had to haul the beast off him. Belle’s very impressed: you’d think the last few months had never happened.”

“He came back,” Neal murmurs to himself. “He came back for us.”

“Like I said,” Emma shrugs, “heroic. I believe they’re on their way here now.”

“Wait, you set a bear on a defenceless woman?” he demands, standing up, finally gaining his balance. “On  _Belle_? What the  _hell_  is wrong with you?”

“I believe you’ve asked me that already,” she stands too, in a fluid motion, and meets his eyes dismissively. “There’s nothing wrong with me. I’m just the only one capable of doing what has to be done.”

“Turning Merida into a bear and sending her after Belle as Rumple-bait?” Neal scoffs. “Yeah, that sounds super necessary.”

“He stepped up!” Emma defends, as if it excuses everything.

“He shouldn’t have had to!” Neal cries. “For God’s sake, Emma, look at yourself! They needed time to talk, to work out who they were, and he needed to come back to himself. Instead they’ve spent their first day reunited running from your insane sidekick!”

“And now he can pull my sword from the stone,” Emma smiles. “Belle’s back in his arms, he’s gained some self-respect, and the town has a hero. I don’t see your problem.”

“She could have  _died_ ,” he tells her, bluntly. “So could I. How are you going to explain this to Henry, that you set a bear on his father and his friend? If you failed you’d have been a murderer!”

“According to Regina he hates me enough as it is,” Emma replies, looking a little brittle, her eyes on the hilt of Excalibur. “I doubt this will change anything. And I protected you. That’s enough.”

“I shouldn’t have needed protecting,” he bites back. “And there’s only so much Henry will be able to bear. Even if we manage to save you… he’ll still look at you and know what you did, even if he knows it isn’t really you.”

“This  _is_  me!” she shouts, and he shakes his head. “God, can’t you understand that?”

“No,” he says, simply. “I can’t. And I hoped that’d mean something, like you’d be better than he was, but you’re not. You’re just as monstrous, just as cruel, and I might understand and I might be able to forgive you for it, but I can’t trust you anymore.”

“So that’s where we are now,” she folds her arms. “Mr Unconditional Love finally placing conditions. Great.”

“How would you feel if I sent a monster after David and Mary Margaret?” he demands, “Come on, Emma! I’ll fight tooth and nail for you but you’re not the only person I’m fighting for. How many times do you think you can hurt my family before I stop being able to look at you and see the woman I love?”

“If you can’t accept me like this, Neal… if you can’t trust that I have to do this…”

“That’s exactly it,” he tells her. “I trust you to love Henry, and love your parents and I trust you to do as you think is best. Hell, I even trust you not to hurt me on purpose, that whatever love you have for me is worth a damn. But I sure as hell don’t trust your judgement or your priorities, or your ability to not hurt everyone you or I care about as collateral.”

Emma regards him, carefully, as if trying to assess him for weakness; she finds none. She opens her mouth to reply, but then there’s a noise on the stairs, and he hears three sets of footsteps come down into the cavern.

“He bested me, fair and square!” Merida cries, and Neal sees his father, still limping but strong, all but striding, Merida and Belle behind him.

“Papa,” he breathes, happier than he could imagine to see his father.

“Bae,” Rumpelstiltskin breathes,  overjoyed to see him, and opens his arms to his son, embracing him gladly. “I thought she’d eaten you,” he murmurs, “Belle told me but… I thought I’d lost you. I’m so sorry, Bae,” he says, when they pull apart, his hands on his son’s forearms. “I left you again, I’m so very sorry.”

“You came back,” Neal reminds him, grinning. “And you had a good reason to leave, to save her. I’m just so glad you’re here now. I missed you, papa.”

Belle steps closer, and hugs them both, the three of them caught up together at last. “He fought a bear for me, Bae,” she tells him, a little wetly. “You should have seen it.”

“Aye,” Merida agrees, and Neal can now see her hands are tied behind her back, the rope held in Belle’s closed fist. “It was damn impressive.”

“This is all very touching,” Emma says, from across the room. “But can we get down to business? You’ve taken long enough that I was getting worried – I was afraid I was going to have to drag you down here myself.”

“Come now, a hero never runs away from his problems,” Rumpelstiltskin says, pulling away from Neal and limping closer to Emma. Emma meets him halfway, her eyes piercing, scrutinising: seeking out his heroism, Neal assumes.

He stands back, next to Merida, and under her breath she murmurs, “Sorry ‘bout knocking you out back there, but she has m’heart. I didn’t have a choice.”

“It’s okay,” he mutters back, “thanks for not, you know, eating me and my family.”

“Anytime,” she replies, with a small smile.

Rumpelstiltskin is limping closer to the sword. “Now, as a former Dark One,” he says, “I know you won’t stop wreaking havoc until I pull that sword from that stone.”

“Good,” Emma says, without looking at him, “Then we understand each other.”

“And I also know that you won’t be able to resist making a deal,” he turns to her, expectantly, and she looks at him with intrigued eyes. “So how about I pull Excalibur, in return for Merida’s heart?”

“And my brothers!” Merida interjects, desperately, “I wanna know what happened to them!”

Neal gapes: never has he seen his father make a deal to benefit anyone but himself, and occasionally Neal or Belle. He’s willing to risk whatever Excalibur could do to him in order to rescue the heart of a young woman who, until this moment, has done nothing but torture, taunt and hunt him, and nearly killed him and his family. He’s doing it because she needs her heart: not because it brings him anything at all. It’s selfless; it’s heroic.

Neal’s heart swells in his chest, so proud he could burst, and he tries to contain his proud smile for all he knows they’re in terrible danger.

Rumpelstiltskin moves past Emma to stand next to the stone, and Emma whirls, suddenly, to face him. “You really think you’re in a position to make deals?”

“That’s exactly what I think,” Rumpelstiltskin replies, calmly, his eyes on the sword.

Emma considers for a moment, watching him, and then turns suddenly to face Merida, her heart in her hands. She steps closer, and then shoves the heart back into Merida’s chest, as Merida hunches over and gasps for air. “I was finished with this anyway,” she says, and Neal rolls his eyes: it’s so like Emma, in any form, to have to have the last word.

Belle lurches forward, untying Merida’s hands as fast as she can, and Neal moves in to help her.

“And her brothers?” Rumpelstiltskin prompts.

“They’re fine,” Emma tells them, reluctantly. “Safe and sound by her mother’s side,” she whirls to face Rumpelstiltskin, “Now  _get on with it_!”

“Wait,” Belle frowns, concerned, “what happens if he can’t pull it from the stone?”

“Emma,” Neal murmurs, warningly. She shoots him a look, but her focus is on Rumpelstiltskin’s hand, inching closer to the sword hilt.

“Then you’ll be sweeping his remains from the floor,” she says to Belle, as if he hadn’t spoken. “You were his maid, once.”

“Emma, come on!” Neal cries, “You can’t be serious!”

Emma doesn’t reply; Rumpelstiltskin’s hand inches ever closer to the hilt. Neal braces himself, unable to watch or to move his eyes away: in a moment his father could be gone, and there’s nothing he can do now.

“It’s okay, Bae,” Rumpelstiltskin says. “I have to do this. And in case it doesn’t work… I’m so, so sorry for leaving today, for always leaving: I’m sorry for never being the father you needed. You deserved the world, Bae. I’m sorry I could never give it to you.”

“It’s okay, papa,” he says. “I understand now. It’s okay.”

Rumpelstiltskin’s eyes are so open and vulnerable that Neal could weep, but he nods, for once accepting the comfort. “And Belle,” he says, his eyes cast down at the stone, at his hands, unable to look at her, unable to see if she accepts his words. “I want you to know that I am sorry for  _everything_. If I had to do it all again, I would make sure I was the man you deserved, right from the very start. I’d change everything for you.”

“It’s never too late,” Belle whispers, and Neal looks at her to see tears in her eyes. Tears he feels mirrored in his own.

Rumpelstiltskin nods, and Neal thinks he can see hope in that little smile: hope for the future, if the sword can be pulled. If he survives this next few minutes.

And then, with determination set like stone in his eyes and his jaw, Rumpelstiltskin reaches out a slow, deliberate hand, and wraps it firmly around the sword hilt. Neal’s heart is in his throat, Belle is all but crying with fear, but Rumpelstiltskin doesn’t waver.

He pulls, and Neal’s breath catches, terrified. 

The sword moves smoothly, like a knife through butter, out with his hand. He brandishes it, holds it up to the light, and Neal sees his father’s eyes stare in disbelief: he did it; he really did it. He pulled Excalibur from the stone!

Belle sighs with relief, her body sagging and relaxing as the danger passes. For a moment, a horrible moment Neal wonders if his father will now take the sword for his own, and use its power to do the same as his magic had before.

“Oh well,” he murmurs, and Neal is relieved when he sees the temptation in his eyes die, replaced with resolution. “A deal’s a deal.” All but contemptuously, Rumpelstiltskin throws the sword down. It clatters on the hard stone ground, just a piece of worthless metal. Emma bends quickly, gracefully, to pick it up in her hand, victorious.

Rumpelstiltskin comes toward her, around her, to join his family. “Now, you may have Excalibur,” he says, as he passes Emma, “But you’ve made one mistake in all this, one terrible mistake.” Emma watches him, questioningly, and Rumpelstiltskin’s lips quirk in a tired but victorious smile. “You’ve turned me into a hero.”

She freezes for a second, and he passes, coming closer to Belle and Neal. Then she speaks, her voice flat, “There are heroes all over this town, and none of them have been able to stop me yet.”

Rumpelstiltskin stops, and Neal sees a flash of his old vigour return, as he bares his teeth and leans in close to Emma’s ear.

“But that’s because none of them,” he growls, “are me.”


	8. Nimue

Emma is making a dream catcher.

It hadn’t been worrying, at first. Neal had found her working at her new hobby late at night, a week or so after their horse ride, and he’d been somewhat touched. It always had been something of a symbol, for them, a reminder of where they’d been, of who they used to be. If she won’t sleep beside him, curled up and sated and pressed close, then at least she’s making something that can evoke a happy memory.

He’d found her in the antechamber off her room, her fingers working furiously around the wooden hoop in her hands. He’d slid his arms around her shoulders, and smiled at her lazily in the mirror. “You don’t sleep,” he’d teased her, gently. “You can’t have nightmares, so why would you need flypaper?”

“You could argue I’m living one,” she had murmured back, her eyes down on her work, and he had sobered. 

“Do you remember the first one we found?” he’d asked her, then. “In that shitty little motel room we’d stolen? When we chose Tallahassee as our home.”

He had drawn a smile from her pale lips from that, and she’d nodded. “I remember. You didn’t even know what it was at first, but you still kept it all those years. Did it ever work, that cheap bit of wood and feathers?”

“I don’t know,” he had admitted, honestly. “I kept it because it reminded me of you. I kept every piece of you I could find,” he had told her, earnestly. He had eased the dream catcher from her unresisting, cold fingers, and captured both of her hands in his. But she’d looked away from him in the mirror, even when he pressed a kiss to her temple, even when he tried to coax her to meet his gaze.

“These aren’t the same, though,” she’d murmured, her eyes on her abandoned work. “These are special.”

Emma had said no more on the subject, and, not wanting to push her to a truth he might not want to hear. “It’ll still be special in the morning,” he’d said. “I know Dark Ones: you don’t sleep, but you still need rest. Come back to bed.”

She’d allowed him, then, to pull her up to her feet and into his arms, and had even smiled when he’d kissed her deeply, and tempted her back into bed. It is wonderful, he’d thought then, to have this back at last. Even with her cursed, even in this strange land, even with his father barely breathing and everything so dark and uncertain. It was an unrestrained joy to have her back in his arms, to have her kiss him, to be able to express his love fully and without boundaries.

That was two weeks ago. Now, the dream catchers tell a very different story.

Now, she’s sat outside the diner, weaving frantically. Her hands are a blur, and her eyes are focused on her task, unblinking almost. This time, Neal doesn’t approach her. This time, he knows what they can do, what makes them special.

They don’t just trap dreams: in fact, one of Belle’s books had revealed a far uglier truth. They remove and store memories.

Merlin summons everyone’s attention. It takes everything Neal has to take his eyes off Emma, not to go over there and rip the dream catcher from her hands, to distract her, to hold her. To not march over and do everything in his power to try to heal this rift that grows every day between her and everyone who loves her, every day she is the Dark One.

“So you can really do it?” David’s voice comes from across the diner, to Merlin, and Neal sighs and leaves his vigil, returning to the group to hear what the wizard has to say. “Take the Dark One dagger and put it together with Arthur’s sword to recreate the original Excalibur?”

“I hope so,” Merlin confirms. Neal wishes he could share Emma’s parent’s relief, but until Emma is safe, he knows he won’t relax.

“And we can use it to save Emma?” Mary Margaret confirms, and Merlin looks a little uneasy.

“Perhaps,” he agrees, “but I need two things: the magical means to unite the two blades, that’s mine and Emma’s quest; from you, I need-“

“The two blades,” Regina finishes, with as much enthusiasm for the gruelling task as Neal himself feels. Robin looks as grim as Regina.

“We’re pretty much at the open warfare stage now: getting the partial sword from Arthur won’t be easy,” Robin adds. 

“Is there a way to do that, then?” Neal asks Merlin, curiously. “Any weakness in the castle or magic we can use?”

“This castle was built long after I was cursed,” Merlin tells him, sadly. “I know nothing of its construction. As for magic, I’d ask your resident sorceress,” he looks to Regina, “she will be far more capable at this than I.”

“And there’s no point asking about the foresight,” Neal sighs, remembering his father’s blinkered view of the future. “All that ‘many paths’ bullshit.”

“Exactly,” Merlin nods, with a regretful smile. “There’s all sorts of ways you could try to enter, and all sorts of outcomes. This is something you’ll need to plan on your own.”

“Perfect,” Regina mutters. “All powerful sorcerer, but the power has all kinds of restrictions.”

“I suppose an Uncle Ben comment would fall on deaf ears,” Neal mutters. Not for the first time he wonders if maybe humour is a defence mechanism when the world is turning to shit. “We’re wasting time just standing around here,” he adds. “Why weren’t we moving on this days ago?”

“Neal, Merlin’s doing all he can to help Emma,” Mary Margaret sooths, but Neal’s getting impatient, tense in his back and shoulders.

“She needs more help than she’s getting!” he tells them. “She’s out there making dream catchers, she’s always making them, all night because the curse won’t let her sleep. And do you know what they can do?”

Regina looks at him, dead in the eyes, “They can remove memories,” she answers, calmly.

“And I always thought gold thread from straw was the weirdest thing,” Neal mutters. “At least papa never tried to mind-wipe anyone with it.”

“I understand,” Merlin says gently, his hand resting on Neal’s shoulder. “I know what it is to lose a loved one to the Dark One, and you have lost two. You are in a lot of pain, but it mustn’t cloud your judgement.”

“No one is lost yet,” Neal mutters, under his breath. Merlin nods.

“That’s a good attitude,” he approves. “And all I can ask of you, of all of you,” he turns to the rest of them, addressing the group, “is that you bring me that sword. And…” he takes a deep breath, and his eyes rest on Neal in particular, “that you have patience with Emma. Her kind of power, for good or evil, is a weight on the soul. And love is a great help… if you can find it.”

Neal nods, understanding, and sees the others nod too. They all love Emma: it’s knowing how to express it in a way that’s helpful to her that’s the hard part.

It’s only an hour before they’re ready to leave, Emma and Merlin. She’s packed a few supplies, and Merlin has spoken to her, although Neal’s sure he doesn’t want to know all of what was said. He wants to go with them, to help, and to see where this curse that has so ruined every part of his life came from. But he also knows that Henry needs his father to keep himself safe, now more than ever, and that he’d only be a liability to Emma and Merlin.

She turns with a smile when she hears him approaching, stood by the well outside, packing the last of her things. “Hey,” she smiles, and it’s good to see her smile, however rare it is these days. Neal remembers a time when she smiled all the time, but those days are long gone and past now.

“Hey,” he grins. “You off on this crazy magic quest then? It’s all getting a bit Lord of the Rings for me.”

“We’re fetching some spark thing from this… alter thing, and facing the ultimate evil that happens to have set up residence in my head. So… yeah, actually, call me Frodo.”

“Frodo didn’t look half as good in a flower crown.” He smiles, and she gives that smile she does occasionally, the one that’s almost girlish, enjoying his affection. It’s wonderful, no matter the circumstance, to be able to give such affection easily, and have it be accepted. 

“We should be back by nightfall,” she promises, “No nine-hour extended editions here. We get this spark, and then I’m on my way home.”

“You love those extended editions!” he cries. “Remember a few months back, you me and Elsa and the whole box-set?”

“Oh god,” she laughs and shakes her head, “The half-hour explanation of the DVD player and how the people weren’t real.” Her smile turns sad, fond, remembering their friend, and she lets Neal put an arm around her waist and pull her into his arms, bracing her hands on his chest. “I miss her. But God, what the hell would she think of me now?”

“You mean the woman who locked herself in an ice palace and almost murdered her own sister due to dark power she couldn’t control?” Neal raises an eyebrow. “I think she’d be better at helping you than any of us.”

“Maybe,” Emma nods, and smiles. “I kinda wish she was here now. Or Lily. Lily’d get it.”

Neal scoffs, “Lily’d be burning half of Camelot as a dragon and encouraging you to pillage villages,” he says. “I like that girl but come on, she’s not exactly a good influence.”

“Neither am I, these days,” Emma points out. “But we’re gonna fix that. With any luck, tomorrow we put the blade together and bam, no more darkness.”

“It sounds risky,” he says, reluctantly. “I need you to come back after, okay? No succumbing to anything, no turning into some hooded scary vengeance killer. I’ve had enough of that for one lifetime.”

“I’ll come back,” she promises. “I’ll come home to you and Henry, I promise.”

He nods, and then remembers something else, and reaches into his pocket, pulling out the swan necklace he’s been carrying around since just after Neverland. He’d never given it back, too scared to push, to remind her of what they used to be, to recall her rejection of him in Manhattan. But now, now she needs it. Now it can be what it always was: a promise of the future, of his love for her, and of how they’ll always find their way home. He dangles it from his fingers, and her mouth drops open.

“Where did you find this?” she gasps, taking it from his hand. She stares at it, admires it, and clasps it around her neck without another word. She looks down at it and holds the pendant in two fingers, beaming. “I thought it was lost years ago,” she breathes.

“I’ve had it,” he admits, a little awkwardly. “I… I kept it. I didn’t know if you’d want it back, but now… it’s survived all this time. It made it to the Enchanted Forest after Neverland, and it found its way back to me. I figure… if this can survive all that time and all that awful stuff, so can we.”

Her eyes are misty when they meet his, and her lips are soft and warm when she kisses him deeply, passionately, her fingers tangling in his hair while he pulls her closer, his hands on her warm back. They kiss for long moments, lips working in tandem, clinging to one another for dear life, and Neal feels warmed through by her kiss. 

They pull apart at last, but stay standing close, her hands on his shoulders and his on her waist, neither of them wanting to let go. 

“You have to survive,” he murmurs, roughly, his forehead pressed to hers. “You can’t die on me, Emma.”

“Neal, I’m immortal now,” she reminds him, gently, pulling back to meet his eyes. “I can’t die today.”

“The Dark One can live on,” Neal denies. “But my dad’s proof that the person inside isn’t. I can’t lose you to this, you have to be careful.”

“I will be,” she says, “I promise.”

“And anyway,” he smiles, looking at the pendant now resting where it belongs on her collarbone. “That pendant was always yours anyway. When I gave it to you, we had nothing, but we were together so we had everything. What sums us up better than a battered, stolen convenience store key-ring that’s been dragged ass-backwards across worlds?”

“What’s that old saying?” she muses for a moment, and he remembers the one she’s thinking of before she does.

“’O Lord, give me strength and health. We’ll steal the rest,” he quotes. “Apt, really: God knows all either of us has going for us is strength and health.”

She grips the pendant and smiles at him, a fierce smile, bright and brilliant, and nods. “We’ll steal the rest,” she agrees, and kisses him again, deep and tender, a kiss of promise, of resolve. She tastes like ozone and deep water, not like Emma at all, but she’s warm in his arms and she’s kissing him, and Neal wouldn’t dare ask for more than this.

“I love you,” he tells her, when they finally part. She smiles at him, bites her lip, and finally says the words he’s ached to hear for so long.

“I… I love you too.”

They laugh, happy, free for the first time, and her smile is like the sun coming up after a long winter. 

Then Neal looks up, and sees Merlin stood over Emma’s shoulder, watching them with some obscure sadness. “It’s time,” he says, gravely, and Neal nods.

“That’s my cue to leave,” he says to Emma. “Come back in one piece or I get Henry a tattoo for his birthday.”

She gasps, and then sticks out her tongue, whacking him on the arm. “I have to go questing now!” she scolds, and he nods.

“Be safe, Emma,” he says, sobering, and she nods, hugging him one more time before breaking away, and stepping back.

“Be safe, Neal,” she replies, and Neal nods, and turns, and walks away.


	9. Birth (part 1)

Neal’s cell phone rings just as they’re leaving Emma’s home.

Rumpelstiltskin, Belle and Merida stop and wait for him, but he makes sure they’re on the sidewalk and some distance from her house before answering. “What’s up?”

“It’s Arthur,” David’s voice comes through, and there’s background noise along with it, as if he’s driving. “He tricked us! He didn’t try to contact Merlin when we left him alone, he tried to burn the crimson crown instead.”

Neal sighs, somehow unsurprised, and rubs a hand over his forehead. Rumpelstiltskin and Belle frown at him, confused, while Merida’s hand goes straight to her bow. He holds up his hand to indicate he’ll explain in a moment. “Okay, so what do we do?”

“We need to confront him,” David says, decisively. “Tonight, when he’s not expecting it. He thought it was burned out, he won’t think we know he’s working against us.”

“He has an army of knights,” Neal points out, “I don’t think you and your wife will be enough firepower.”

“Snow’s at home with Leo,” David explains, “I have Robin here, we’re going to find him now and catch him alone, before he can summon his forces. We can’t hope to match him if he gets to his army.”

“Then let me come too,” Neal replies. “I know my way around a sword, I can be back up.”

“Bae?” Rumpelstiltskin steps forward, as if he’d take the phone from him. “What is it, son?”

“One second, papa,” he mouths back, as David replies.

“Where are you? We’ll come find you.”

“Outside Emma’s new place,” Neal tells him. “I have Merida too if you need extra help, she owes me one.”

Merida rolls her eyes, but nods. Neal smiles at her in gratitude.

“Merida?” David asks, confused, “Who’s Merida?”

“I think we met her in Camelot,” Neal explains, “She’s really good with a bow.”

“Okay, give us a couple of minutes,” David replies, and hangs up. Neal returns to his family.

“What’s happening, son?” Rumpelstiltskin asks, concern and fear creasing his brow, and Belle looks no less worried.

“It’s that rat bastard Arthur, isn’t it?” Merida demands. “Emma mentioned he was in town.”

“You know him?” Neal asks, surprised. Merida nods.

“Aye, not well, but by reputation. His army invaded my kingdom, and my father died in the attack.”

“So you’re all in for taking him down?” Neal checks. “That’s why David called: they were trying to contact Merlin this morning, with something called a Crimson Crown? Apparently they trusted Arthur alone with it, and he burned it rather than use it to call the wizard.”

“Don’t think much of your friends’ intelligence,” Merida mutters. “Leaving that man alone with powerful magical items.”

“I did warn them against it, to be fair,” Belle interjects. “Not that they ever listen…”

“Don’t endanger yourself, son,” Rumpelstiltskin begs. “Let the heroes handle this one, come home with us.”

“No, papa,” Neal shakes his head. “This man stands between us and the only person who can save Emma. I have to help bring him in. And you’re in no position to talk anyway, Mr I-fought-a-bear-tonight.”

“Be safe?” Belle asks, “Please? We already lost you once tonight.”

“M’sorry about that, alright?” Merida shifts uncomfortably, “I had to do what I was told.”

“Come fight with me now and all is forgiven,” Neal grins, and tries to ignore the worried wince on his father’s face. “I’ll keep my phone on, papa,” he compromises, gently, turning to Rumpelstiltskin. “And I’ll stay well behind David and his sword.”

“We’ll be back at the shop,” Belle tells him, and he sees the pride in her eyes even when the worry crowds it in his father’s. “Come find us when you’re done, alright? Let us know you’re safe?”

He nods, “I will.”

“I won’t let anything happen to him,” Merida promises Rumpelstiltskin, earnestly. “I owe you, y’know, for my heart. You didn’t have to help me.”

“Keep him alive and we’re even,” Rumpelstiltskin manages. Merida inclines her head.

They see David’s pick-up truck come down the street as Belle and Rumpelstiltskin disappear around a corner. “I might not go back to the shop too fast,” Neal murmurs to Merida. “I think I’ll give them a little time alone.”

“You think they’ll get right to it?” Merida asks, bluntly. “Ye’d probably be best giving them a couple of hours then, let them get a few rounds in before you interrupt.”

Neal stares at her, aghast, “Images I didn’t need!”

“Oh come on you’re no wee lad,” she chides, “Or do y’need me t’explain where babies come from?”

“That’s my father!”

“My point exactly,” she grins. “He nearly died to save her, I’d say she’d be grateful for that. _Very_ grateful.”

“Oh thank God,” Neal mutters as the pick up truck finally pulls up next to them. He opens the door and clambers in, while Merida stares at the car.

“I was chained up on one of these!” she cries. “What in God’s name is it?”

“It’s called a truck,” Robin explains, with the patience of a man who has also struggled with this. “It’s like a horseless carriage. If you get inside we’ll get to Arthur’s camp far faster than on foot.”

“Aye,” Merida clambers in next to Neal, “I’ll brave anything if we’re gonna cause trouble for Arthur.”

“You’re not from Storybrooke, then?” David asks, as they set off back down the road. “You came over from Camelot?”

“Last I remember I was hunting wisps,” she says. “Next I know I’m chained in some tunnel against one of these… things, and the Dark One’s telling me she has work to do.”

“Emma set her on Belle,” Neal explains, grimly. “She wanted to make my dad a hero, at any cost.”

“Aye, and I’m sorry for it. He’s a decent man, you’re dad, even if he’s a bit…”

“Tiny and anxious?” Neal asks, and Merida nods.

“I wee bit, yeah. Though that thing with the sword made up for it.”

“The sword?” Robin asks, urgently, “The sword in the stone?”

“Aye,” Merida confirms, “That’s the one. He pulled it right out and gave it to the Dark One, so she’d give me my heart back. Quite a feat for such a tiny man.”

“Rumpelstiltskin pulled Excalibur from the stone?” David demands, astounded. “I thought you had to be a hero to do that!”

Neal feels anger flash through him, automatic and defensive. “He sacrificed his life trying to contain the Dark Curse, then saved Belle from a bear with nothing  but his cane and some luck. He wasn’t always the Dark One!”

“That man was the Dark One?” Merida gapes at him. “That explains a lot but still! He’s so tiny!”

“He’s taller than Belle!”

“Yeah well I could fit her in m’quiver,” Merida sniffs.

“So Emma has Excalibur, Arthur’s secretly a villain, Merida was a bear, and Rumpelstiltskin is a pure hero?” Robin sighs, and presses his hand to his forehead. “Did the whole world just turn upside down when no one was looking?”

“Seems that way,” David murmurs, as they pull up on a forest track, in front of a group of tents that Neal assumes belongs to Arthur’s party.

They jump out, quick and quiet, and David starts toward one of the larger structures. “That’s Arthur’s tent,” he tells them, his hand reaching for his gun. Neal grabs a sword from the back seat – he decides not to ask why David keeps half an armoury in his pick up truck, the answer being sort of obvious – and follows, as Merida pulls her bow. “I’ll go in first,” David says, as he takes the lead, “You three stand guard.” The others fall into formation behind him automatically: this is no one’s first fight.

“Do you think our dishonest King will put up a fight?” Robin asks, and Merida snorts.

“If he does he’ll regret it,” she says.

David bursts in on Arthur without preamble, and Neal, Merida and Robin stand outside, ready to fight off anyone who might interrupt the confrontation. Inside they hear talking, friendly greetings turning quickly to accusations, the voices quickly growing sour and angry. Then there’s an almighty crash, the sound of a sword being drawn, and Neal and Robin both draw their own blades as Merida loads her bow, ready to fire.

Arthur tears his way out of his own tent as David cries out, “He’s getting away!”

Merida fires her bow, but misses, the arrow flying into the woods. Before she can reload, Arthur breaks through the treeline, and Neal follows in hot pursuit, grateful to have a release for his anger at Emma. This is the man standing between him and saving his true love. This is the man whose agenda, whatever it is, matters more to him than saving Emma.

This is the man with the answers. Neal’s feet pound on the undergrowth as he sprints through the trees in hot pursuit of the traitorous King.

They race through the forest, Neal only paces behind Arthur but too far to catch him, too far to tackle him down. The blood pounds in his ears as he flies after Arthur, his heart racing with desperate to catch him, to make someone pay for all that was almost lost tonight. Emma is too far to reach now, all but lost to the darkness, and she almost killed his father and his stepmother. Arthur may not be directly responsible, but he’s a villain Neal can fight, and Neal needs something to fight right now.

The anger boils in his veins, blocking all but the visceral, the cold night air on his skin, the ground beneath his feet, and the all but overwhelming urge to hurt Arthur beyond belief, to punish him for standing in their way.

Arthur tries to jump an exposed log, but his foot catches and he trips, falls, his armour-clad body hitting the forest floor with a heavy clatter. He lies still, apparently out cold and Neal follows, cautiously, stepping over the log and walking up to him, hoping to find him unconscious.

Arthur’s leg swings around out of nowhere, and catches Neal’s ankle, shoving his legs out from under him and throwing him to the ground. His back hits the earth and the breath is forced from his lungs, and he gasps for breath, trying to process his next move. Neal learned to fight with the Lost Boys, young scrappers desperate to draw blood at any cost. He’s not used to fighting grown men, trained knights, who were born in armour with a sword in their hand.

He hears Arthur jump to his feet, and Neal reaches out desperately, scrabbling on the floor for his sword. It lies just out of reach, and before he can grab it, Arthur is on him, the point of his sword pointed Neal’s throat.

“Don’t get that,” Arthur commands. “You’re out of your depth here, peasant.”

Neal sighs, and rolls his eyes, “That’s so like the nobility to make this about status,” he mutters, although his heart is racing with adrenaline and fear, and he’s racking his brains for a way out of this. He’d promised his father he’d come home safe. If he dies here, by Arthur’s hand, then he doesn’t know what Rumpelstiltskin or Emma will do.

“And it’s so like a common boy to lose his borrowed sword,” Arthur replies. “If you’d been trained properly, you’d know not to let that go. It’s always the common mistakes that get us killed.”

He pulls back is sword, and Neal braces himself to roll aside as he deals the killing blow. He tries to move, hoping desperately that this isn’t the end… it can’t be, he can’t die here, he can’t-

There’s a clang, metal on metal, and he opens his eyes and scrambles back to see Emma, out of nowhere, pushing Arthur’s sword back with Excalibur’s serrated edge. She heaves to the side, forcing the sword from Arthur’s hand, and he staggers back, winded and astonished. She holds him at sword-point, and Neal watches as Arthur takes in the newly joined blade. She did it then, Neal thinks, she reunited the two halves. Now whatever terrible plan she has can come to fruition, and no one can stop her.

He’s failed her.

“Excalibur,” Arthur breathes, desperate and wild hope and fear warring in his eyes, and he stares at Emma, “It’s whole?”

“Yes, it is,” she replies, her sword arm not wavering for a second, staring him down with those flat, soulless eyes. “But it’s not going to help you. This sword doesn’t control anyone now.”

She punctuates her statement with a wave of her hand that throws Arthur through the air in a high arch, and slams him bodily into a thick tree trunk. He crumples, an unconscious mess of armour and lost ambition, and Neal regains his feet, staggering back and away from her. She walks a little way toward Arthur, and Neal imagines she might just walk away, as if nothing happened, as if this doesn’t matter.

“You saved me,” he says, calling her back. His words contain neither gratitude nor condemnation. “Why?”

“You don’t need an explanation,” she snaps, turning to face him, “Just don’t do that again.”

“Is this an apology for Belle?” he demands. “For what you did to my papa? Is this you showing you still care about me?”

“As much as you care about me?” she retorts. “You, the guy who not an hour ago called me cruel and a monster, and said I’d lost your trust?”

“Because you do cruel and monstrous things!” he cries. “And then you come along and save my life out of nowhere. One minute you’re you, and the next you’re the Dark One, and through it all I still love you. I still want to help you. But you have to start talking to me. I heard David mention a Nimue? Who is that? And what does the sword really do that was worth what you did to Belle and my father?”

“Nimue doesn’t matter anymore,” Emma tells him, flatly. “None of it matters, this will all be over tomorrow.”

“What will be over tomorrow?” he demands, sick of her talking in riddles, “Why do you sound like an apocalypse movie every time you speak?”

“I’m the Dark One,” she tells him. “I don’t expect you to understand.”

“You forget I know you, Emma!” he returns. “And I know the Dark One!”

“So you keep saying!” she shouts back. “But I don’t think you know it as well as you say. If you did you’d understand why I’m doing all of this!”

“Why, then?” he demands, “What the hell is this all for? Why torture my father and set a bear on my stepmother? Why hurt Henry? Why are you _doing_ all of this?”

“I’m doing it all for you!” she screams, the first real outburst he’s seen in forever, shaking the blank determination of the Dark One free, the real Emma revealed for just a second. Neal reels back, unable to comprehend what she’s just said, the words not making sense.

“What?”

“You asked me,” she explains, gathering herself, taking a deep breath. “I told you. I’m doing this for you. If you want to help me, stay out of my way.”

She marches off, into the woods, her sword in her hand, and Neal, speechless and at a loss, cannot find breath to call her back.

Arthur is still crumpled on the floor. Neal pulls out his cell phone, and ten minutes later Robin and David are hauling Arthur into the van, his arms and legs tied.

Neal is shaking with rage, and no one tries to talk to him on the ride back to town. They lock Arthur in the available jail cell. Neal doesn’t take his eyes off the other man until he awakens, blearily, and tries to escape.

“Ah, you’re awake,” he snarls, “Good.”

He gets to his feet, and marches to the bars, “Now, who’s Nimue?” he hears his own voice, cold and cruel: his father’s voice. He doesn’t care. Mr Gold always got answers, at least.

“I don’t know,” Arthur says. Neal shakes his head.

“You’re lying,” he sneers, and comes close to the bars, his hand on his sword hilt. “What happened in Camelot? Why the hell are you trying to keep us from Merlin?”

“I wish I knew,” Arthur replies, fear and anger at war in his eyes, but Neal doesn’t care. “That blonde demon took my memories same as you.”

“Then why are you constantly getting in the way?” he demands, quietly, his hand coming to grasp Arthur by the throat, squeezing hard, “What is it you’re not telling us?”

“I don’t talk to peasants,” Arthur gasps, his face turning red. Neal pulls back, releasing his neck, and Arthur smiles in relief for a moment.

Then, swiftly, easily, Neal slams the heel of his palm into Arthur’s throat. Arthur buckles, gasping for breath.

“That’s enough!” David roars, pulling Neal bodily away from the cell, “He said he doesn’t know anything! He’s a king with no kingdom and, much as he hates it,” David turns back to Arthur, still trying to breathe. “He’s not important anymore.”

Arthur can’t even meet David’s eyes, still clutching his bruised windpipe. Neal finds a grim satisfaction in watching his enemy retch, trying desperately to draw breath, to survive, from one quick blow of the hand.. That’s a trick Pan taught him, and it’s served him well. Neat, efficient, and quick: not bad for an untrained peasant.

Neal’s breathing hard as he turns away from Arthur. He walks back toward Snow and Regina to avoid dealing another blow. “Feel any better?” Regina asks, sardonically. “Didn’t know you had that in you.”

“Yeah well, Lost Boys learn a few tricks,” he mutters. “And I won’t feel better until we have some answers. Emma said something about this all being about me, but that seems…”

“Like a manipulation?” Regina finishes. “Yeah, because it is. You should know better than anyone, that’s what the Dark One does.”

“It’s more complicated than that,” Neal shakes his head. “Everything my papa did was about me, too, and that wasn’t a game. The Dark One manipulates to get what they want, but their motivations don’t change, just their means of achieving them.”

“What, so because Rumple was obsessed with finding you, Emma must be too?” Regina scoffs. “I guess egotism is genetic.”

“It didn’t sound like the Dark One,” he denies. “Just like when papa used to tell me he was trying to protect me, it’s the real person coming through. It sounded like Emma.”

“There may not be an Emma, not anymore,” Snow sighs, shaking her head. Neal feels like throttling her for giving up so easily on her child, but he figures he’s had enough strangulation for one night.

“She’s right,” Regina agrees. “This Dark One… she has Excalibur, and she is going to destroy all light magic.”

“So the moment she can’t live up to your heroic fantasies you give up on her?” Neal demands. “You think saving magic is more important than Emma?”

“Neal, of course not!” Snow snaps, exasperated. “But we can’t stop the darkness without light magic, and if Emma succeeds we’re all doomed, her included.”

“You don’t think it could be more complicated than that? My papa cast the curse to save me from an alien world, but it ended ours. A bad thing can be planned for a good reason.”

“And if we’d stopped him, then Emma would have grown up a princess, and none of this would have happened,” Snow argues, stoutly, but Regina’s eyeing him speculatively.

“And I wouldn’t have Henry,” Regina murmurs. “But just because there were good outcomes doesn’t excuse it.”

“I never said it did,” Neal agrees. “But… she said this was for me, and I’ve heard a Dark One say that before and mean it. I can’t give up on her now.”

“No one’s given up,” Regina assures him. “If she hasn’t used the sword yet, it means she needs another ingredient to cast the spell. So we find out what it is, we stop her, and we get our Emma back.”

Neal shakes his head, “I don’t think there’s time for that. You can research all you like, but something happened in Camelot, something that involved me. The only way to solve the problem is to work out how it started.”

He storms off, away from them, and Regina calls him back but he barely hears her. If he wants to understand Emma, there’s someone in town who knows her better than she knows herself, and he’s waiting for Neal in the pawn shop.

Neal bursts in and sees his father at the counter, freshly changed and holding a snow globe in one hand. Belle is nowhere to be seen, and he hopes to God she’s not naked in the back room.

“Papa,” he pants, and Rumpelstiltskin turns to see him, a relieved smile on his face.

“Bae,” he breathes, and they cross the room to each other, Neal knowing his father will need to hug him to believe he’s really all right. “What happened out there?”

“Bae?” Belle rises from behind the counter, behind Neal, and lowers her crossbow.

“Where’d you get the world’s smallest crossbow?” he asks, as she rushes around the counter to join in the hug, the three of them wrapped up together for a glorious moment. She laughs and hugs him tight.

“Granny,” she explains. “She remembered about Merida and left it for me. What happened?”

Neal steps back, away from them, and tries to marshal his thoughts. “I confronted Arthur,” he tells them. “He ran from David and I caught him in the woods. He nearly killed me, but Emma stepped in just in time. She _saved_ me, papa, even after what happened with Merida.”

“That’s a refreshing change of pace,” Rumpelstiltskin mutters, with a glance to Belle. “Not trying to murder my loved ones.”

“Yeah,” Neal agrees, “And then… papa, she said something really strange. She said she was doing all of this… for me.”

“Well, I can’t fault her there,” Rumpelstiltskin murmurs, with a sad, crooked smile. “You were always my reason, after all.”

“But… does that make this my fault? If for some reason… if something happened in Camelot that made her like this, because of me? I already broke her once, papa.”

“Oh, Bae,” he murmurs, shaking his head, “Have you been wondering that all these years? If the crimes I committed as the Dark One were somehow your fault?”

“Without me you’d never have taken on the curse,” Neal shrugs, awkwardly, unable to meet his father’s frank, open gaze. “And if I’d never fallen through the portal…”

“You made my life mean something, Bae,” Rumpelstiltskin corrects him, gently. “You’re the only reason I’m still standing here, why the Dark One couldn’t corrupt my heart for three hundred years. Knowing I could still find you was all that kept that darkness at bay. Nothing I, or Emma, ever did under the Dark One’s thrall could ever, ever have been your fault.”

Neal nods, trying not to say anything to ruin the moment, trying not to cry in his father’s company. He nearly died twice today, nearly lost his father to the town line and Belle to a bear, and Emma’s so far away now he can barely see her. For a moment everything is overwhelming: he’s grateful for his father’s hand on his shoulder, steading him, grounding him, as welcome and comforting now as it was when he was a young boy afraid of the soldiers.

“Are you safe here?” he manages, with a glance to Belle’s diminutive weapon. “That won’t help you much against Emma.”

“I’m not much use with a sword,” Rumpelstiltskin says, finally pulling away, walking back around the counter. “This was the best we could do for protection. I did have some squid ink set aside for a rainy day, but ah, unfortunately…” he swings the painting from the wall and reveals the safe hidden behind it, and opens the door. It’s empty, and Rumpelstiltskin gestures to the empty box with a look of exhaustion. “She found it.”

“What could she need that for?” Belle wonders aloud, frowning. “What does it do?”

“It’s powerful stuff,” Neal replies. “It does a lot of things, but it’s best use is in freezing people in place. You get even a drop of it on your finger, you won’t move for hours.”

“That sounds like something we want in Emma’s hands, then,” Belle sighs. “Do you think she’ll use it?”

“It’s single-use, unless you’re very careful,” Neal answers. “She’s probably just keeping it as a precaution. And so that no one else has it.”

“Dark Ones are like that,” Rumpelstiltskin nods, grimly. “Paranoid, defensive, surrounded by back-up plans and contingencies. She’d never leave a flank like that open, not if she could help it.”

“What do you think she’s thinking, papa?” Neal asks. “You said you know her better than she knows herself… what’s in her head right now?”

“You said she claims she’s doing all this for you?” Rumpelstiltskin asks, with a shrug. “That’s a feeling I know well. And I think you’re right about Camelot: something happened there, something bad, and it involved you, my boy.”

His father’s hand shakes on his cane, sad and fearful, and Belle quietly goes to stand beside him, to hold his arm and comfort him with that touch. Neal’s glad they’ve reunited, at least for now: his father needs someone to stand by him, and Neal has to be out there on the front line, fighting for Emma.

“So you think she’s out to protect me?” Neal asks, sceptically. “Because I didn’t feel protected being knocked unconscious in the woods while my stepmom ran from a bear.”

“I think she’s atoning,” Rumpelstiltskin tells him, simply. “The Dark One takes your judgement but not your guilt. You know you’re hurting people, people you love, and you want to make amends, but it never works out that way. I think whatever happened in Camelot, she did something she regrets. And I think somehow she wants to us Excalibur to rectify it, the same as she did with the horse and young Henry.”

“So I just need to work out what that is,” Neal nods. “I… thank you, papa,” Rumpelstiltskin inclines his head, but his eyes are troubled.

“Bae… I know you love her, but please, please try to stay safe. I… I couldn’t bear to lose you again.”

“I will, papa,” Neal promises. “But Emma’s fighting the same curse you did. I left you alone with it: I can’t make the same mistake twice.”

And with that, he marches out into the cold night air, leaving his father’s worried eyes to follow him out the door.

—

_Camelot_

They’re tied to trees.

Neal sags, and sighs, why the hell does he always end up tied to a tree?

For once, the memory of Neverland is almost comforting: at least he always knew where he stood with Peter Pan. At least Pan doesn’t haunt his nightmares, the way the smirking woman in black stalking around the grove, smirking and taunting her captives.

Zelena is the only person Neal has ever truly wished dead. And here she is, alive and well, and once again she is in control, and once again Neal cannot break free.

He shudders all over, thankful for the first time that at least his father is spared this. And Belle. Belle who he hasn’t seen in hours, since yesterday in fact, when she set out with Merlin, Robin and Charming to free Lancelot. Belle who could also be captured, in fact, and what a pretty prize she’d be for Zelena: Rumpelstiltskin’s true love, the woman who stole his heart.

 _Shit_.

“Hey, guys,” he says, anxiously, trying to keep his voice low to avoid Zelena’s notice. “Anyone remember what happened to Belle?”

“I think she and Merida went off together somewhere,” Charming replies.

“You mean Merida who we’ve barely met and who could be evil, for all we know? You were supposed to protect Belle!”

“She’s a grown woman, Neal,” Charming replies, uneasily, but Neal can tell the oversight bothers him. “And she’s smart. I’m sure she can look after herself.”

“If anything’s happened I’m going to kill you,” he murmurs. Robin glances back at him.

“If something’s happened to Belle, we’ll find her and save her,” Robin promises. “Once we’ve gotten out of here. Somehow.”

“My sister does have a knack for tying ropes,” Regina notes. “Probably learnt it down at the docks in Oz, trying to pick up sailors to fill her daddy issues.”

“Oh, that was a lazy swipe, sis,” Zelena snickers. “You’re getting sloppy. Hypocritical, too, coming from a woman who’ll bed anyone: stable boys, kings… tree rats.” She looks Robin up and down, and Neal shudders at her predatory gaze, and how uncomfortable Robin is in her presence. For all the horrors he suffered at her hands, Robin has survived far worse. “Although I have to admit,” she purrs, her hand on her barely-curved belly, “That last one gave as good as he got. Didn’t you, tiger?”

Neal feels he might vomit.

“Hey, Zelena!” Neal calls out, drawing her attention, unable to watch her torture Robin any longer. “Rapist bitch says what?”

“What?” she demands, confused, and Neal, Regina, Snow and Charming all snicker. She stalks over to him, anger all over her twisted face, her hand raised in a claw. “Watch it, Junior,” she snarls. “Emma might not be so fond of you with half your face scarred.”

“She’d still love me more than anyone loves you,” he retorts. “You know, it’s really pathetic: all of this because my dad wouldn’t fuck you when you were a teenager.” He looks her up and down, allowing every inch of his contempt for her to show on his face. “You’re nothing, Zelena: you stopped mattering the moment my dad stuck a knife in you. Shame he didn’t finish the job, really.”

“How dare you!” Zelena summons a fireball to her hand, and with a roar of incoherent rage she draws back her arm, ready to set Neal ablaze. “That’s enough, Zelena!” Arthur shouts. “Not until the Dark One gets here.”

“I’m here!” Emma calls, and Zelena hurries to stand by Arthur and poor, tethered Merlin as Emma walks through the trees, an odd wooden box in one hand, determination on her pale face. “Leave them alone.”

“Only if you have what we want,” Arthur stipulates.

“I brought the dagger and the flame,” she reports, grimly, anger casting her face in stone. “But you don’t get it until you free my family.”

“No,” Arthur replies, brandishing the blunted half of Excalibur. “You will hand it over now, or I will unleash Merlin.”

“Emma, please,” Merlin begs, “I don’t want to fight you.”

“Oh, but I do,” Zelena swaggers forward, and Neal feels a rush of instinctive fear at seeing her so close to Emma, no matter how invulnerable Emma might be. “Now that mummy’s got her magic back, tell me, Dark One,” she leans down to Emma, “What’re you gonna do?”

—

Storybrooke

Neal walks grimly toward the yellow bug, calling out into the dark night. She doesn’t respond, doesn’t appear out of the night, doesn’t even bother to answer him. “Fine,” he mutters, “we’ll do this the hard way, then. Emma Swan! Emma Swan!” he starts banging his fists and his feet against the car, denting the cheap metal, scratching the paintwork, ruining the only physical thing he knows still matters to her, “Emma Swan!”

“There’s no need to make such a racket I’m right here,” Emma says from behind him, and he turns to see her there, grim and expressionless as ever, sword in one hand, her eyes flat. “The bug didn’t do anything to you.”

“Property damage usually gets someone’s attention,” he shrugs, “I figured next thing was a brick through your window.”

“And here I thought you were going to really lose it,” she murmurs. “Throw yourself off a building or something.”

“I have a family, Emma,” he reminds her, coldly. “I love you, but you’re not all I love.”

“Then why spend half the night screaming my name?” she asks. “What can be so important?”

“You know what,” he tells her. “Camelot. Whatever the hell happened to us there. You owe me the truth.”

“Do I?” she raises an eyebrow, “You don’t remember what happened. How can you be sure what you are and are not owed? How many times have you told me I owe you nothing?”

“That was before you tried to kill my family,” he tells her. “Emma owes me nothing: the Dark One owes me the world, by now. A simple answer is more than justified.”

“You really want to know the truth?”

“I can’t help anyone if I’m wandering blind. Look, I know how it is to be the focus of the Dark One’s plans. I know it’s always about two things: protection, and regret. I forgive you for whatever you did. I know that the Dark One does things the person inside would never dream of on their own, I mean, who knows that better than I do? Please just tell me, and then we can do what we do best: we can work it out together.”

“That’s what we do best?” she asks, “Huh, because we didn’t work out what to do with Henry together, or how to get me out of jail, or how to build a life. I made those decisions all on my own.”

“Oh come on, Emma. I’ve spent the last two years working day and night to atone for that, I know it was wrong. But I did it to get you home to your family, and I did it without knowing about the jail cell or Henry.”

“You were my family,” Emma’s voice shakes, just a little, beneath the dead monotone. She reaches into her pocket and pulls out the swan pendant: Neal stares at it, frowning as a piece falls into place. “You gave me this and promised me forever.”

“I thought that was lost,” he swallows, hard. “I searched for it, but it was gone when we got back from Camelot.”

“You gave it to me,” she tells him, softly. “You told me you loved me, and that it had survived all this time, just like you and me.”

“It has,” Neal nods. “Three worlds and counting.”

“Just like us,” Emma nods. “Survivors.”

“And we can survive this,” he presses, “Emma, I will love you no matter what you did, no matter what happened. We’ll weather it, we’ll fight it, we’ll survive it. Just tell me.”

“You really want the truth?” she checks. “No matter how awful?”

“My dad slaughtered an army right in front of me then threw me into a portal to nowhere, my grandpa psychologically tortured me for a few centuries, and then I was homeless and abandoned in New York City. Yeah, I’ll cope.”

She nods, remembering all of that, and then swallows. “Okay, then… there’s something I need to show you.”

Emma waves a hand, and they’re on her porch. Neal looks around, getting his bearings, as she opens the door and lets them into the dark, sparse house. “This place is… as grim as I remember,” he murmurs. “You’ve not redecorated in the last two hours. You gonna show me where you had my disabled father shackled to a wall?”

“You saw that downstairs,” she reminds him, and he balks at her calm attitude as she walks toward the table where he’d found the dream catcher just yesterday – yesterday, only yesterday, his mind reels.

“Then where’s this truth you’re on about?” he asks. “What’s here that you couldn’t tell me out there?”

“The truth is tricky,” she tells him, and he hates her tone, that blank monotone, and the slippery words so like his father before her. “You have to look for it.”

She gestures to a telescope stood by the window, so similar to the one Michael Darling had used to look at the stars. “Okay,” he nods, “you wanna play I-spy, that’s fine.”

He crosses to the telescope, and looks into it. His breath catches in his throat: through the telescope he doesn’t see Maine, the view from her window, but a dark pier, a beach, a few tourists taking a midnight walk on the sand and the bars still open, people talking and laughing, happy and free. “Tallahassee,” he murmurs. “You found it.”

“I lived there,” she reminds him. “For two years after Phoenix. I thought… I thought you might like to see home. To remember what we were reaching for.”

“We can’t leave now, Emma,” he tells her, tearing his gaze from the telescope, returning to her. “We have a life here, you told me so yourself when we came back from the past.”

“We still have our dream, though,” she says. “Tallahassee was just a name on a map. What it meant was so much bigger than a town in Florida with a beach. It was home. I wanted to show you home.”

“In a city I never ended up visiting?” he asks, frowning. She shakes her head.

“No,” she says. “That was the dream, but this…” she gestures around her to the empty house, “This was the reality. This is the home you picked for us.”

She holds out a newspaper, and Neal takes it with trembling hands. His handwriting, messy and all but illegible, is next to a red circle around this very house in the real estate listings. “You told me you’d found us a home,” she tells him, as he gapes at her. “That… that you wanted a permanent place in Storybrooke, to set down roots, and that you wanted Henry to be able to live with you sometimes. That I could live here too, if I wanted.” She manages a small smile, “Even after I’d kissed you you offered me my own room, as if I’d ever want to be apart from you. Everything I’ve done since then has been to bring us home, all of us, you, me and Henry, the way it should have been from the start.”

“What have you done, Emma?” he asks her, gently, “In service of our home, what did you do?”

“Not yet, almost, not yet…” She grabs him by his lapels, and hauls him in for a kiss, and Neal groans low in his throat and kisses her back just as fiercely, desperate for her, trying to drink every touch and sound and caress of her lips in as they kiss as if their lives depend upon it. It’s a drugging kiss, a snatch of home in a strange world, and he clings to her as tight as he can: his hands on her hard shoulders, her fingers in his hair.

She pulls away to press her forehead to his, “I can’t tell you yet, not until it’s over,” she breathes, “if you knew what I was really after, you’d do everything in your power to stop me.”

The world starts to twist and swirl around him, and Neal staggers, recognising the sensation: she’s drugged him, a kiss to send him to sleep, and as he sags into her arms she holds him tight, and the world turns to inky, empty black around him. “No…”

—

_Camelot_

“So, Dark One,” Zelena stands at Emma’s side, waving a hand toward her family members, bound to their trees. “Who should I kill first, your mouthy boyfriend? That’d be a nice little gift for Rumple whenever he wakes up… Oh, or your father? I’ve always wanted to murder a prince.”

Emma looks at them, and Neal sees the moment she gives up, the moment she knows she’s beaten. He tries to shake his head: anything, even his life, is worth it to stop Zelena and Arthur achieving their ends, but it’s no good. “You can have the flame,” she says to Zelena, her eyes still locked on Neal’s, and hands that wooden box to the witch.

“Zelena!” Arthur calls, “Make sure that’s real.”

Zelena makes a face, but opens the box. To Neal’s delight, something flies out of it, something he recognises: pure darkness, the tarry, slippery black bands that consumed Emma, now fly from the box and ensnare Zelena, wrapping around her wrists and dragging her back against a tree herself. Neal finds it easier to breathe knowing the witch is contained.

“Now,” Emma snarls, “you wanna give me my family, or keep fighting?”

“Merlin!” Arthur cries, and Merlin tries to resist, Neal can see it, begging Emma with all he has.

“Please, Emma, give him the flame. This is a battle you cannot win.”

There’s a moment, one final quiet moment, and then blue magic bursts from Merlin’s hands at the same moment golden magic does from Emma’s. The two bright beams meet in the middle, clashing and burning, battling for dominance. Neal can hardly breathe, his heart in his throat as Emma braces herself, pushing with all she has against the magic forcing her backward, but it seems to do little good: the Merlin’s power overwhelms hers, pushing her back and back, the blue slowly engulfing the gold in the light fighting between them.

“I wish you could defeat me, Emma,” Merlin gasps, “But I’ve been playing this game for too long.”

The flames evaporate as with a final shove, Emma is thrown backward, defeated, and Merlin stands the unwilling victor. Neal swallows, hard: this is the end, now. Arthur will butcher them all in front of Emma, and she is powerless to stop him.

“Merlin!” Arthur commands, “Kill her mother.”

Merlin turns to Mary Margaret with dreadful purpose, and draws up his hand, summoning a vine to snake down the tree and wrap around her neck, constricting her throat, drawing her neck high and tight as she gasps for air. Neal sees Emma look up from the floor, watch what is happening, what is being done to her mother… but she is unable to stop Arthur, or break Merlin free from the control over him. Mary Margaret shakes and wriggles, desperate for air, but Merlin is unable to stop, his face a mask of fear as he tightens the pressure from the vine on Mary Margaret’s windpipe.

“Merlin,” Emma pleads, “You have to fight it!”

“I can’t!” Merlin gasps, agonised, as his magic wrings the life from the woman before him.

“You are the greatest sorcerer who has ever lived!” Emma cries out to him, “If you cannot fight off the darkness, no one can!”

Neal sees the fight on Merlin’s face as he tries to wrench himself free of the compulsion. It’s a look he’s seen before, when Zelena ordered his father to kill him, to drown him in a well. Merlin’s fighting it, as hard as he can, and then, at last, finally, his hand withdraws; the vine recedes, and Mary Margaret draws a gasping, shuddering breath.

“I said kill her!” Arthur commands, outraged, “By the sword, I command you! Kill her!”

Neal wrenches at his bonds with renewed fervor as he sees Merlin struggle to disobey, to not follow Arthur’s desperate command. He drags the ropes again and again against the rough tree bark, and at last, out of nowhere, one of the ropes gives: his hand is free, and with it he can undo the other.

“I can’t hold him off much longer,” Merlin groans.

“You will kill her,” Arthur pants.

“No, he won’t!” Neal shouts, and charges at Arthur, using the element of surprise to catch him off guard. He tackles Arthur with his whole body, sending both of them crashing to the ground. Arthur waves Excalibur, trying desperately to catch Neal, to kill him, and there’s a brief burst of pain under Neal’s chin as the sword catches him. He wrestles it out of Arthur’s grip, pinning the other man’s hands with his body weight, and then slams the heel of his hand into Arthur’s throat, leaving him choking and gasping for air.

He rises to his feet, and kicks Excalibur out of Arthur’s hand, safely away from his reach. “That doesn’t belong to you!”

Arthur looks up at him, scrabbling for his sword, but Neal stamps on his hand, hard. Arthur wrenches his hand away, and struggles to his feet, staggering back and away from Neal’s murderous gaze. He runs for Zelena, brave as ever, and cuts her free with the edge of his gauntlet. “Get us out of here!”

She waves a hand, and with one final glare at the group of them, they vanish in a flash of green smoke.

A small burst of Emma’s magic has everyone else’s ropes undone, and Charming runs to Snow, checking her for injuries, assuring himself she’s alive and safe. Neal is pleased when Emma comes directly over to him, and braces her hand on his chest, checking his own body for wounds. “Thank you,” she breathes, and he smiles at her.

“Peasant boy takes down King Arthur,” he grins. “How’s that for irony?”

“Oh, no,” her eyes fall to the cut on his neck, where Excalibur scratched him. “He caught you, are you alright?”

“Come on, you know I’ve cut myself worse than that making breakfast,” he teases. “It’s no big deal, don’t worry about it. Better than being murdered at the hands of the world’s worst Disney hero.”

“Another movie ruined,” she shakes her head, and presses her forehead to Neal’s. Neal takes a deep breath, and draws comfort from her presence, from the contact, her head to his. Her hand cups the cut on his neck, and he feels a familiar ripple of magic heal the cut. “There,” she breathes. He grins down at her.

“You wanna kiss it better, too?” he asks. “Please?”

“We’re so not necking in front of my parents.”

“Why not? Your parents are necking in front of us.”

She looks over, and sure enough Snow and Charming are apparently trying to conceive a third child against a tree, desperate – Neal assumes – to remember they’re both alive and well. “Guys!” she whines. “Come on, we have rooms at Granny’s!”

They break apart a little sheepishly, but they’re grinning, and Neal can’t help it either. Emma goes over to embrace her parents, and he watches from the sidelines, wishing that his father and Belle were here too. He misses his family.

“Hey, you guys!” he crouches down to the floor, and picks up Excalibur: it’s oddly light, too light for a blade of its side. Magic is weird. “Look what I found!”

“We did it!” Mary Margaret cries, overjoyed. “Now Emma can reunite the blades, and we finally get the darkness out! You’ll finally be safe.” She hugs her daughter again, closer, and Neal smiles at them, at Emma and her family. Emma’s parents can annoy the crap out of him, but seeing how much they love their daughter, he can’t regret anything he did to reunite them, however painful.

They’re back at the diner within half an hour, walking in pairs, no one wanting to walk alone. Henry embraces them both when they come in the door, and Belle is by the window, watching with a smile. “Hey!” Neal greets her, gathering her up in a hug as she rises to say hello. “Where were you, I was worried sick!”

“I got kidnapped!” Belle tells him, and he rolls his eyes.

“Oh, is it Tuesday already?” he teases, and she smacks him with the back of her hand.

“I helped reunite a broken kingdom and crown a Queen today,” she tells him. “What did you do?”

“Uh… I let my worst nightmare team up with an evil King to take over the realm, then got tied to a tree, called Zelena a bitch, then rugby-tackled King Arthur and gave him several bruises. So… kind of a mixed bag?”

“How long until you noticed I was missing?” Belle raises an eyebrow. Neal squirms.

“Okay, first of all we have no cell reception here. And second, you do that whole Strong Independent Woman thing so well, we all… kinda assumed you were doing your own thing.”

“Next time I do my own thing, there’ll be less head injuries,” she grumbles. “Can people stop knocking me out, please? I’ll end up brain damaged or amnesiac again at this rate.”

Neal smirks, and then his attention is taken by Henry tapping his shoulder, “You slammed King Arthur?” he asks, excitedly. “Like, full on WWE?”

“The Rock’d be proud,” Neal grins, “If you want someone on the ground you gotta use your whole body.”

“You have to teach me that,” Henry says, “Along with the advance lock picking you promised.”

“There’s no secret, Henry,” Emma interjects, slyly. “You just rush the guy and catch him by surprise. No skill required.”

“Okay, next time you can do it then,” Neal retorts. Emma smiles, sweetly.

“But why keep a dog and bark yourself?” she teases, and he glares at her, trying to look angry but unable to keep from smiling. They’re safe, and they can save her, and Emma is already sounding more like herself than she has in weeks. It’s possible that everything can really come out right in the end.

“How’re you doing, mom?” Henry asks. “How’s the spark coming?”

“I, ah,” Emma looks down to the box in her hands, that contains the true spark of Prometheus. The ember smoulders there, bright but not yet burning. Not enough to forge a blade. Neal looks at her, his brow furrowed, but she doesn’t explain why she looks so distant. “I think I need a little time,” she tells them, after a moment, the shine once again lost. “I need to be by myself.”

“Emma?” Mary Margaret calls after her, as Emma hurries from the diner, but Neal knows better than to chase after her just yet. If she says she needs time, then she won’t appreciate being interrupted right away.

“She’s going to work on the spark,” Neal explains, to prevent Mary Margaret from rising from her seat. “She says she needs time alone to do that.”

Mary Margaret subsides, but Neal can see that her ordeal in the woods has left its mark. She watches Emma go with worry creasing her smooth features, and Neal wishes he thought it was misplaced.

He tries to set it from his mind, and turns back to Belle and Henry. “So, you got kidnapped?” he asks, determined to not dwell on Emma’s sudden departure. “I’m assuming the crazy redhead Robin saw you with?”

Belle chuckles at that description, and launches into a spirited account of her adventure saving a kingdom called Dunbroch. For all the guilt he feels for allowing this to happen to her, Neal can’t say it seems to have been a bad thing overall: Belle has returned with a renewed sense of self, of purpose, and of faith in her ability to save Rumpelstiltskin and help Emma. Her eyes are sparkling again, glowing with excitement, and Neal enjoys listening to her story as Henry asks intrigued questions.

Their conversation is only broken up when Charming, Regina and Robin return from their scouting through the forest. “Well, the woods are clear,” Charming reports, without preamble. “Zelena and Arthur must have retreated somewhere far from here.”

Belle looks to Merlin, a little grimly, “Well, I’m afraid Merlin won’t be much help,” she sighs. “Resisting Excalibur’s taken its toll on him.”

“And Emma?” Regina asks, concerned. “How’s she doing with the spark?”

Mary Margaret looks at Regina apologetically, “She said she needed some time alone,” she tells her, “she took it outside.”

Regina gives them all a hard look, and then with a somewhat dramatic flare of her crimson velvet cloak, she turns on her heel and walks right back out of the door to find Emma.

Neal watches her go with a sigh: Mary Margaret he could have stopped, but Regina on a mission is a force to be reckoned with. And Emma has probably been out there by herself long enough, in any case. It saves him a journey.

“Now,” he says, turning back to Belle. “Merida was about to turn into a bear…”

Belle smiles, understanding what he’s doing: distracting himself and Henry from their anxiety. She nods, and continues with her story.

“Hey, Neal?” Mary Margaret interrupts, a few minutes later. “Is that… is Regina holding the dagger?”

Neal slides off his seat and runs to the window, looking where Mary Margaret is pointing. “Oh, shit,” he mutters: she’s right, Regina is holding the dagger, commanding Emma to do her bidding. “Come on!”

“Right behind you,” Charming agrees, marching out of the door, leading the three of them down the path to the well, where Regina and Emma stand locked in their awful tableau.

“Tell me what you’re really afraid of!” Regina commands, as Charming approaches her and Neal, thinking this might be another tackling moment, stands behind her.

“Regina, what are you doing?” Charming demands.

“I’m getting answers!” Regina tells him, unrepentant. Neal has had enough.

“Not like this!” he scolds, and grabs Regina’s arm, forcing the dagger down and snatching it from her fingers. “What the hell is wrong with you? Do you think you’ll make anything better by forcing it?”

“Someone had to do something,” Regina snaps at him. “She’s hiding and if she doesn’t come out of that shell soon, she’ll never be able to give up the darkness. Trust me, I know.”

“I’m sorry Regina, but you know nothing about this,” Neal tells her, bluntly. Regina stares at him, surprised, but Neal doesn’t waver. “The Dark One is nothing like anything you’ve experienced, you have no right to use that on her!” He looks to Emma, who’s glaring at Regina, her face utterly shut down. “Are you okay?” he asks, trying to keep the anger at Regina from his voice.

Emma doesn’t reply: she just grabs the ember and the two blades, and marches away into the woods, her mouth set in a thin, grim line. Mary Margaret rounds on Regina, and Neal’s gratified to see her at least as angry as he is. She’s suffered at the hands of a compulsion today too, after all. They all saw how disobeying damaged Merlin.

“You really think you’re helping her by being cruel?” she demands. Regina, true to form, shows no remorse.

“I wasn’t being cruel!” she insists, as if she’d know it if she was. “I’ve been cruel, and trust me, you’d know it. I was getting to the truth!”

“Yeah, sorry Regina,” Neal says, “But I don’t think you know the difference between cruel and kind anymore. That was unacceptable, no one should be using that thing on Emma, not for anything!”

“It’s not my fault that the truth is painful,” she mutters, self righteously, folding her arms. Neal just watches Emma vanish into the forest with a sinking heart.


	10. Birth (part 2)

_Storybrooke_

When Neal awakens, he’s back in that basement room, chained to the floor. “Shit,” he mutters, as he comes to, his head banging. “I need to sleep at some point,” he murmurs, “Real sleep, somewhere a long way from this pit. This is all a bit Silence of the Lambs, don’t you think?” he shouts, his voice echoing in the dank chamber, but of course Emma doesn’t answer.

“Do you ever get tired of your own voice?” a chill runs down Neal’s spine, his stomach turning with instinctive fear. He turns, slowly, and sees Zelena sat there, chained to the floor the same as he is, smiling at him in the gloom. He wishes he’d torn out her throat himself when he had the chance.

“I could ask you the same thing,” he snarls back. “I’ve heard more than enough of you for one lifetime, how the hell are you not dead yet?”

“Ooh,” Zelena presses her unchained hand to her breast, her mouth open in false shock. “Puppy’s got teeth when he’s not chasing at Emma’s heels. That’s a nice surprise.”

“What the hell are you doing here?” he snaps. She raises her eyebrows.

“I’m here to get a tan,” she remarks, sarcastically. “The Dark One locked me up, obviously! I mean, first she gave me cursed fried foods so I’d give birth within six hours, and then the moment the baby’s out, I’m locked up down here. Your girlfriend’s a piece of work, I’m almost impressed.”

“It’s me she must really hate,” he tells her, dismissively. “She locked me up here with you.”

“Aww, and here I thought you’d missed me,” Zelena replies, acidly. “We used to spend so much time together, Neal, don’t you remember? You’d fumble with your father’s wheel and pretend not to know I was there. How is dear old daddy, anyway? Last I saw him he was half dead in a hospital bed.”

“I’m going to kill you, Zelena,” Neal tells her, softly. “When we’re out of here, and things are back to normal, I’m going to find you and I’m going to do everything to you that you did to my father, that you did to me. You’ll lose a body part for every crime you’ve committed against my family and my friends. My father gave you a quick death, once, and you made him suffer for that mercy. That won’t happen twice. If you manage to survive, you’ll wish you hadn’t.”

Zelena stares at him, and for a single, delicious moment, Neal can see real fear in her eyes. She covers it, rallies: but he sees her squirm away from him a little, sees her eyeing him warily.

“Well,” she murmurs, shakily. “I have to say, that was impressive. What happened to you, puppy? Did someone kick you a little too hard?”

“I don’t know,” he admits, giving his best impression of his father’s deadliest smile, enjoying her fear. “I think it started when someone locked me in a cage for a year, and tortured my father in front of me.”

“Well, now your insane girlfriend has ripped my child from my body, and separated me from my newborn daughter. Regina and Robin will have her hidden from me before I can get out, and I’ll never see her again.”

“Huh, for once in this town someone makes the responsible parenting decision.”

“Come on, Neal,” she pleads, her voice sad, a little broken, and he wonders for a moment if she’s sincere, if she really feels the pain she’s trying to convey. “How would you have felt if you’d had your son for a moment, had him warm in your arms, only to lose him? To know someone else would raise him, love him, and you’d never matter as more than some lost relative someone mentioned at holidays?”

“That was my life, Zelena,” Neal sighs. “My son was raised by the same woman who raised your daughter.”

“And you’d choose that again, if given the chance?” she scoffs. “I don’t think so. I think you’d grasp any chance to be with him, in fact I know it. That’s how you ended up in my cage in the first place: you were trying to find Henry, and your father was trying to find you.”

“What’s your point, Zelena?”

“My point is that judging by the spell she’s got cooking up over there,” she gestures to the table where Excalibur was mere hours ago, “Emma’s going to try to remove my magic, and God knows what she plans to do with me after, or with you. I have to escape if I have any chance of meeting my daughter. Please, Neal.”

“Why would she need your magic?” Neal wonders aloud, confused. Emma answers the question before Zelena can.

“I don’t,” she says, simply. They both stagger to their feet, not wanting to be caught off guard on the ground, as Emma strides between them to the table covered in magical paraphernalia. “I’m giving her mine instead.”

“What?” Zelena demands. Emma looks at Neal, ignoring the witch altogether.

“Neal, you were right,” Emma insists, “I have no reason to destroy light magic, and I don’t want to. My intention is to destroy all dark magic, destroy the curse, forever. Think of that – it’s what you always wanted! Vengeance on the curse for what it did to Gold and to me, for ruining your life.”

“But Emma, if that’s what you’re doing then why all the secrets and lies? Why not tell us – we’d all have helped you!”

“You can’t help me, Neal,” she says. “You and my family would have had to try to stop me, because only I have the stomach to do what’s necessary. The right thing isn’t always the nice thing.”

“Oh, and that’s where I come in,” Zelena breathes, something clicking into place that Neal’s still reaching for.

“Yes!” Emma cries, “The darkness needs to be contained in a vessel: you.”

Zelena glares at her, while dread swells in Neal’s stomach. He wants Zelena to suffer, but he knows that part of him isn’t the one he should listen to, the one that’s telling him what’s right. And he can’t stand for Emma to do anything more to fall into the darkness, to have any more blood on her hands “Emma, what does that mean?”

“It means I’m going to do what needs to be done,” she tells him, and the knot in his belly tightens. “I’m going to cut her down with Excalibur’s enchanted blade,” she continues, and Neal feels bile rise in his throat, locked in terror at the monster that has become of the woman he loves. She looks so earnest, so sure of herself and her path, while she talks about cold-blooded murder. “The darkness will be vanquished forever,” she tells him, exultant, victorious and yet grim.

“That’s why you needed my baby out,” Zelena nods, understanding at last.

Emma looks at her without remorse, “I don’t want anyone to get hurt who doesn’t have to, there are limits.”

“Murder itself should be a limit!” Neal cries, and Zelena laughs at him, hollow in her throat.

“This from you, who promised to murder me slowly not five minutes ago?” she scoffs. He shakes his head.

“I hate you, Zelena, but it was the heat of the moment, not… this,” he gestures to Emma, watching him with her eyebrows raised, as if waiting for him to agree with her terrible plan. “This is madness, Emma, this is as bad as anything my father ever planned.”

“Neal, you know what this woman is capable of,” she pleads. “She tried to kill you, she imprisoned you and tortured your father for over a year, she raped Robin and murdered Marion… she’s a monster. Given time, she will kill you too.”

“After today, you can be certain!” Zelena vows. Neither of them spares her a glance.

“It doesn’t matter who she is or what she’s done,” Neal insists. “This is about your actions, the choices you make, and how far into the darkness you fall. I couldn’t give a shit if Zelena lives or dies, but I can’t watch you kill her and know you bear the consequences of cold-blooded murder. Darkness can’t be vanquished with more darkness.” She just watches him, steadily, as if she knew he would say that and doesn’t care. “Come on, Emma,” he begs, “We went to Camelot to find Merlin, right? David even said they almost contacted him tonight, given time I’m sure he can find a way to save you, without resorting to this evil!”

Emma doesn’t blink: it’s as if she’s already considered this option and knows it won’t work, and is just waiting for him to catch up to her thinking.

“Merlin can’t help us anymore,” Emma tells him, softly. Something terrible sits in the back of Neal’s mind, and his stomach churns, a deep and awful truth buried somewhere here, somewhere he can’t quite reach.

“Why not?” he asks, fear and anger both bending his mind, “Emma, what happened in Camelot? Why are you doing this, where is Merlin? Is he even still alive?”

Emma’s inability to meet his eyes is all the answer he needs.

—

_Camelot_

“Hey,” Neal sinks onto the log next to Emma, and looks at the ember and the dagger next to one another on the ground at her feet. “You enjoying your Dark One brooding? I think my dad felt it was the highest perk of the job?”

“You gonna use the dagger on me too?” she asks. “If I don’t brighten up and come back to the diner?”

“Oh come on, Emma,” Neal sighs, shaking his head. “You know me better than that. I’d rather stab myself with that thing than use it to control you.”

“Neither option is good,” Emma says. “And Regina seems to feel differently.”

“Yeah well, Regina’s always been of the  ‘ends justify the means’ school of thought,” Neal reminds her. “This same woman slaughtered half a realm trying to flush out one renegade princess, I think her judgement’s a little off.”

Emma snorts at that. “Fair point.”

“So what’s up with Mr Glowy?” Neal asks, gesturing to the ember. “He not responding?”

Emma turns to him and raises one eyebrow, “Mr Glowy?”

“Originally I thought of Calcifur but then I remembered you were always Disney girl, no time for Miyazaki,” he teases. “The Disney thing’s a little ironic these days, isn’t it?”

“Neal,” she shakes her head, “this isn’t funny.”

“I know, I know,” he nods, and wraps an arm around her shoulders, pulling her in for a hug. “I’m just trying to make sure you know that nothing’s changed. We’re still us; this is all still as madcap and ridiculous as it’s always been. Things’re easier when you can laugh at them.”

“Regina was right, though,” Emma tells him, pulling away to look him in the eye. “I do know why I’m scared to let go of the darkness.”

“And?”

“And,” she continues, “it turns out, unsurprisingly, to be all your fault.” She pulls a familiar newspaper from behind her, and hands it to him. Neal recognises it well, and sighs, shaking his head.

“Okay, I know that between us we have to have taught that kid to be a sneaky liar somewhere along the way,” he laments. “How’d he come out so honest?”

“He thought I ought to know you’re thinking of getting a place,” she shrugs. “He said you guys were calling it Operation White Swan,” she adds. “A plan to get us all a home.”

“I… yeah,” he rubs the back of his neck. “That kid has the world’s biggest mouth,” he adds, “he gets that from you.” He looks at her, squinting, trying to work out if she’s upset. “You’re scared of IKEA furniture and decorating?” he asks, trying to lighten the mood.

“I’m scared of my oldest dream coming true,” she corrects him, and his heart skips a beat. “I mean, I love you, Neal, I always have. But this… we picked Tallahassee over a decade ago. This means being adults it means… it means putting down roots. I don’t know if I know how to do that. And if we do this… then I have to start doing that the moment the darkness is gone. No more running, no more searching… I have to be found.”

“You already are, though,” he half-shrugs, with a smile. “Remember back in the past, when we were down in my father’s vault and you made the wand work? You told me you’d found your home in Storybrooke, with your family. I just figured… if we’re together now and we have Henry, why not live like a real family and not like teenagers sneaking out for a beer?”

“Wow, look who became a responsible adult,” Emma snorts, but there’s something real in her eyes, something deeper. “A family man.”

“We’ve been a family since the moment we stole the yellow bug,” he corrects her, gently. “And we have a child, we love each other… And anyhow,” he grins, and points to a part of the description he thinks she must have missed, “It has like five bedrooms. So you can have your own room, your own space: no pressure at all. I just wanted to finally… to make a family home for us. That is… if you want it?”

“That’s just it,” her eyes brim with tears, her voice trembling, “I do want it. I want all of it. But it’s all ive wanted for so long that it’s scary to make it real, to make it something that isn’t just a dream in the back of my head. And it becomes real once the darkness is gone.”

“I personally can’t wait,” Neal smiles, “come on, we’ve faced scarier than this. Trust me, what’s a house compared to a dragon?”

She smiles, and nods, and pulls him toward her, her hands on his jaw, kissing him deeply. “I trust you,” she breathes, and he smiles, his forehead pressed to hers. He’s never heard anything sweeter, anything better, than those words from her lips.

“Hey, look!” he cries, when they part for breath: the ember is glowing, burning bright, and Emma looks down with a smile that is full of surprise and joy. “Guess you’re not afraid anymore,” he grins, and she nods, her eyes full of tears.

“I guess not,” she agrees, and kisses him again, before pressing a hand to the picture of their house and beaming at him. “Let’s go home.”

—

_Storybrooke_

“Do you hear Emma pacing around up there?” Zelena asks. Neal glares at her: it’s hard to pretend she doesn’t exist when she speaks. “Come on, pup, what’s she thinking?”

“I’m not a puppy, Zelena,” he snarls, “and you know as much as I do. We have to find a way out of here.”

“These shackles aren’t the problem!” she cries, “This one is!” she holds up her arm and shows him the leather cuff that restrains her magic, and he stares at her.

“There is no way in hell I am letting you loose with your magic, Zelena,” he tells her, “You forget I know exactly what you’re capable of.”

“Without magic neither of us is getting out of here alive,” she tells him. “I’m your only option. These cuffs are magic, even you can’t pick them! I know you don’t care what happens to me, I know you have every reason to hate me and want me to suffer, but if you leave me here Emma will kill me, and then she’ll be lost to you forever. You know what happens when a Dark One becomes a killer. You lost your father… if you leave me here, you’ll lose Emma too.”

He stares at her, turning her words over, trying to find a lie or a flaw in her logic. There isn’t one. She’s right: if he leaves her here, if they don’t escape, then Emma will succeed and he’ll lose her forever.

“Fine,” he snarls, “but come near me or my father and I will personally rip out your lungs, understand?”

“Understood,” she nods, but there’s a smile on her face, victorious. Neal reaches into his pocket and pulls out his penknife, and Zelena extends her wrist. He slides the knife under the leather cuff, and pulls upward, tearing the fabric in two.

Zelena sighs in relief, and then waves her hand, vanishing the chains entirely. Another wave of her hands has her clothed in her black garb and hat again, out of her hospital gown. “Thank you, puppy,” she grins. “That was very helpful. It feels so good to be back.” She swaggers over to him, and Neal, despite his feet now being free, refuses to recoil. “Now then, if there’s one thing I did learn from your father, it’s that a deal’s a deal. Shall we get out of there?”

He nods, shakily, and they walk together to the stairs, and Neal hopes with every clack of Zelena’s heels on the floor that he hasn’t made a terrible mistake.

The house has an odd, sickly yellow glow to it as they move into the main room, and Neal hopes like hell they’re not already too late. The light is coming from outside, but with the curtains drawn he can’t make out what it is, or if anyone is outside the front door. “Good,” Zelena says, “she’s busy. We’ll have to sneak out the back.”

“I can’t leave her,” Neal says. “Whatever’s happening, she needs me here. I have to stand by her, I have to help her fix whatever mess she’s making.”

“Suit yourself,” Zelena shrugs. “You always were too stuck on nobility to live very long. If you survive, pass on my best to daddy dearest. Ta-ta!”

She trots over to the back door, and is gone in a moment. Neal is left alone, trying desperately to think of a plan.

It comes to him in a moment: the squid ink.

He runs to the first wall he sees and starts to ransack the place, turning over every painting and table, opening every box and drawer moving every trinket, searching desperately for what he needs. If he can use it to freeze her, painlessly, he can buy time to get answers and to fix whatever she’s done outside. But he has to move fast.

Finally, he takes down the painting from the wall, seeking a hidden safe.

“I was trying to help you!” Emma says from behind him, and Neal searches around him, trying to find anything to hold her so she won’t knock him out again.

In a surge of good luck, the squid ink is tied to the back of the painting. He rips it from its binding, and throws it at Emma, coating her in the stuff, freezing her in place. Excalibur clatters to the floor.

“I’m sorry, Emma,” he says. “But I can’t let you do this, and this is the only way I have to stop you.”

“Oh, you’re going to want to do more than just stop her in a minute,” Zelena’s voice comes from the back door, and she returns to Neal’s side, holding a dream catcher in her hands. “Once you see what I found outside.”

“Why are you back?”

“I just thought I could shed some light on these answers you’re seeking,” she smirks, “as you know, I love making your family suffer, and this is a real treat. Emma’s been quite the naughty girl. Want to see?”

Neal’s curiosity, his grim dread of what he might see in the dream catcher, and the need to stop Emma’s plans all come together, and he nods, shakily, allowing Zelena to come closer.

“Watch this,” she grins, and Emma cries out.

“No!” Zelena’s knife whistles through the air and plunges into Neal’s chest. The wound is deep, the knife slicing through skin and tissue and muscle and blood, and yet… and yet it feels as if she merely scratched him. The pain is muted, far away, and when she pulls it back out he heals instantly.

Ice rushes through his veins. “Emma,” he murmurs, around numb lips, terrified and furious and lost, so very lost, all at once. “What have you done?”

“Bet you didn’t see that coming!” Zelena cries in delight, “Oh, but nothing compared to the surprise you’re feeling right now! ‘Wait, I just got stabbed in the chest! Why doesn’t it hurt more? Why am I not dead?’”

“Zelena?” he stammers, “What the hell is happening?”

“Oh, well you could take my word for it,” she suggests, smiling, “Or you could return the memories that the Dark One stole.” She holds up the dream catcher with a bright, cruel smile. “See for yourself. I found this outside.”

“Don’t trust her,” Emma begs, and Neal wants nothing more but to obey, except he knows the dream catcher won’t lie, and the knife that still drips with his blood and yet left no scar… something terrible has happened, to him, something beyond imagining, and only the dream catcher can tell him what. “Neal, I can explain everything, please, Neal please.”

“I need to see,” he sags, “Emma, I need to see.”

Zelena gives a delighted giggle, and waves her hand over the dream catcher.

And all at once, Neal remembers everything.

—

_Camelot_

They’re ready, at last: the ember is burning, the blades are together, and Merlin is watching over them all, ready for Emma to start the spell.

Five minutes, Neal thinks, five minutes and she’ll be safe: the Dark Curse will be destroyed forever. In five minutes the endless, agonising part of his life that started when his father emerged from the woods covered in blood and scales will be over. And then a new era can begin: he and Emma and Henry under one roof, his father awake and restored at last, finally able to rebuild a better life.

Neal has never been more ready for anything in his life.

“Now, Emma,” Merlin intones, “Are you ready?”

“Yes,” Emma replies, without a moment’s hesitation.

“Then it’s time,” Merlin is almost smiling, almost, and Neal’s excitement wars with his worry. They’re so close, so close, and yet anything could still go wrong in these final, crucial minutes. Merlin strides forward, and opens the box with the spark inside. “To destroy the darkness, once and for all.”

Emma looks down at the task in front of her apprehensively, but her hands are steady, and Neal knows that she too is finally ready to do this.

Merlin steps back, and Neal gives Emma a reassuring smile as she meets his eyes. “It’s just magic, right?” he says. “No big deal.”

She nods, smiling back briefly, taking what comfort she can. They’re together in this, and this is good work.

He watches, proud and full of anticipation, as she levitates the flaming ember from the box before her, and turns it over and over in the air. She moves it, shapes it between her hands, and then meets her palms in the middle, galvanising the flame with her magic, her strength, until it’s a bright, glowing orb, floating steadily before her face. Large enough and hot enough to weld the two blades into one blessed weapon, and defeat the darkness once and for all.

Emma picks up the two blades, and brings them up, one in each hand, to meet in the fire.

Neal feels it the moment the blades touch: pain, sharp and hot, lancing through his neck, reopening the cut Arthur left but deeper, harder, as if the blade had sliced through his artery, through muscle as well as skin. He gives a low cry, the pain astonishing as he feels the blood begin to run from the gash on his throat, and he presses his hadn to it, as if he could stop the bleeding with his fingers.

“Neal, what’s wrong?” David asks, concerned, as the blood runs between his fingers.

“He’s bleeding!” Belle cries, “Someone help, he’s bleeding out!”

“Neal?” Emma shouts, horrified, “Neal!”

“No!” he manages back, as he sinks to the floor, the strength leaving his legs. Belle tries to catch him but he’s to heavy. He shoots out a hand, open palmed, knowing what this means but also knowing a price when he sees one. “No,” he says again, “No, Emma, you have to complete the spell, forget about me.”

“No,” she shakes her head, her face crumpled with grief, her hands dropping the weapons as she crouches beside him, her quest forgotten in her worry. “No, I won’t, I can save you, it’s okay, I can save you.”

“No, you won’t,” he croaks out, the pain in his throat extraordinary, as if he’s being slowly beheaded with a dull knife. He can feel the wound spreading, growing, his blood running freely from the cut even as Belle presses napkins to try to stem the flow. His whole body is weak, shutting down. He’s dying. He’s dying so she can live.

There are worse reasons.

“I have to,” she weeps, her tears running as fast and hot as his blood. “Neal, I can’t let you die for this.

“What’s happening? Didn’t she heal him?” Regina demands.

“It’s a wound from Excalibur,” Merlin explains, heavily. “A wound that can never heal, not even with magic. Not mine, not even Emma’s. I’m sorry, Emma. No mortal man could withstand such a blow, even one so shallow as that.”

“Neal,” she breathes, lost in her grief, as he feels the life slipping out of him, the world growing fuzzy and dark.

“Belle,” he croaks, “Belle…”

“I’m here, Bae,” she replies, gently, her hand cupping his cheek, “I’m here, I’m here.”

“You have to wake up my dad…” he croaks out, coughing on his words. “You have to tell him… tell him I love him. I forgive him. Please…”

“I promise, I promise,” she nods, weeping openly, stroking his hair, “Oh, Bae, please, please don’t go.”

“Henry?” he turns to his son, desperately trying to get one last real look at him before the dark swallows him whole. “Henry?”

“I’m here, dad,” Henry’s voice is shaking, choked with tears, but his brave, stoic boy is strong beside him, healthy and whole. “I’m here.”

“You be brave, okay?” he asks. “Look after your mom. Be the hero I know you are, for me.”

“I will,” Henry’s crying openly, and he presses a kiss to his father’s hand as it weakly cups his cheek.

“You’re a good kid,” he groans. “I’m so lucky I knew you.”

“There has to be something we can do, that she can do!” Mary Margaret cries.

“There is,” Emma murmurs. “There is something I can do.”

“No, Emma,” Neal shakes his head. “We already found Tallahassee, okay?” he nods, smiles, tries to convince her, “We’re together, we have Henry, we found a home. Please, just reunite the blades: destroy the Dark One. Do it, and my life will have meant something.”

“No!” Emma cries.

“What do you mean? Emma!” Regina shouts. “You heard Merlin, there’s nothing to be done!”

“But that isn’t true, is it?” Emma demands, “You said yourself how powerful I am, well let’s use that power! I can use the promethean flame to untether you from the sword, and then tie Neal’s life to it instead.”

“Emma, you know what that could do.”

“You have to unite the blades,” Neal sputters, every word a torment. “Please… Emma please… let me go.”

“You’re not going anywhere,” Emma says, decisively, her voice back to that low and determined growl that is so much the Dark One. “I can save you. You said no mortal man,” she says, turning to Merlin, “Well, I can fix that.”

“You’ll create another Dark One,” Regina tells her, “You can’t do that.”

“It’ll multiply the darkness,” Merlin confirms, “So it cannot be destroyed, not without you paying the steepest of prices.”

“Emma, no!” Neal cries, agonised, terrified. “No, you can’t, please, please just let me die, don’t do that, please don’t do that.”

“I have to,” she says, “I have to, I won’t watch you die, I won’t lose you again, I can’t! Don’t leave me here alone, Neal! You cannot abandon me again, not again, you can’t!”

“It will be your final step into the dark,” Merlin tells her. Emma doesn’t care.

“I don’t care what happens to me,” she breathes. “I have to save him.”

“Emma, you can’t,” Mary Margaret crouches next to her.

“It’ll create a darkness we cannot control, Neal wouldn’t want that,” David agrees.

“Emma your parents are right,” Regina agrees.

Emma rounds on her, desperation in her voice, and screams in her face. “If you could have saved Daniel, or Robin… look how far you were willing to go! How far you pushed me to save him!” she turns back to Neal, grasping onto his coat for dear life. “I won’t lose him too, not again, not if I can save him. And I won’t let anyone stop me.”

In a moment they’re outside, the sun beaming down through the trees, and he’s lying on grass he thinks he recognises. When he looks up, an arbor of yellow roses tumbles down the side of a low building. The stables: the place she kissed him for real, for the first time in years. The place they found one another again.  
He wishes he could be with Henry and Belle, and with his sleeping father, if he is to die today. But at least here he has Emma, and a happy memory to guide him to his death.

The light is fading fast, and Neal can’t feel anything but the pain in his neck, the blood still seeping from the wound. It’s spread: the ache extends down his throat to his chest and shoulder now, and he knows his time is close. he hopes so, at least: the other option, Emma’s desperate gambit, is too awful to contemplate.

“Emma,” he croaks, “Emma it’s alright, please, just let me go.”

“No,” she shakes her head, “No, you left me all alone once, you don’t get to do that to me again.”

“You can’t do this to me,” he tells her, gently. “You can’t: I can’t imagine a worse fate than that. Please, I’d… I’d rather be dead than cursed. You know that. You have to choose the good. I’m… willing to be the price you pay to end the darkness.”

“No, no it’s okay,” she shushes him, strokes his hair, kisses his lips. “Neal, it’s alright. You’re the best person I know – we can fight this together. You and me: against the world. It’s just magic, right? We can do this.”

“No,” he shakes his head, and groans in pain, “No, Emma, this curse has already destroyed everything I love. We can’t leave Henry with two Dark One parents; it’ll ruin him, like it ruined me.”

“He can’t lose his father,” she weeps. “I won’t let that happen. I can’t lose you. We’ll fight the darkness, and we’ll win, for good, together. Please, Neal, I don’t want to find Tallahassee if I can’t find it with you.”

“I’ll be happy knowing you have your home,” he tells her, “with Henry, with your family. I’m alright with… with dying, if it saves you.”

He fumbles, gasps the last words, his lips turning numb, and then the dark he’s been fighting since the cut first bled creeps over his senses, the numbness reaching his head and his mind, and he slips into unconsciousness.

The last thing he sees is Emma’s face, slack with horror, her eyes fixed with a dreadful determination. He thinks his final words, unable to speak, hoping she’ll know, hoping she can hear him.

Please, I love you; please don’t do this to me.

—-

_Storybrooke_

“Emma?”

“Neal, please,” she’s weeping, crying, like she did when he was dying, begging him to forgive her, to understand that her need for him is more important than his dying wish. “Please, I had to save you.”

“You didn’t save me,” he murmurs, his mind buzzing, confused, spinning, furious and terrified and sick, sick to his stomach. “Emma you didn’t save me. You sold me to my worst nightmare because you were too selfish to let me go.”

“Neal…”

“I was begging you, Emma,” he steps around Zelena, ignores her victorious smile because she doesn’t matter now, nothing matters now, not his life and apparently not his death. He’s supposed to be dead. He should be dead.

Death would have been better than this.

“Neal I couldn’t, I couldn’t let you go, I couldn’t let you leave Henry, please…”

“You should have,” he murmurs. “Emma, this is so much worse… this is the worst thing you could have done to me. You betrayed me, infected every inch of me, against my will… you violated me, with the force that has ruined everything else in my life.”

“I didn’t have a choice,” she says, around her frozen lips. “Neal, you have to understand.”

“Here, it gets better,” Zelena grins, and hands him Excalibur, which he takes with a shaking hand. “Look.”

He runs his eyes along the blade, and his stomach churns, clenches, revolts. His whole body shudders when his worst nightmare comes to life, and he reads the name on the end of the blade.

Baelfire.

He has to wake up. He has to wake up. This is a dream, a nightmare, he’s asleep in his father’s hovel, in the Darlings’ nursery, in the camp in Neverland, in the back of the Bug, in New York… he’s asleep, he has to be: this is the part wehre he always, always wakes up.

But the world stays steady, awake, alive, real.

“You turned me into the Dark One,” he murmurs, the betrayal sinking deep, every inch of him revolting against the idea, the very notion that Emma, his true love, his found family, everything that has mattered for so very long… that she could take the love he had for her, and use it to turn him into this. His own, personal hell. “How could you do this to me?”

“You would have died,” she begs. “Neal, you would have been dead, I couldn’t live with myself if you’d died for me, I couldn’t let you leave me again.”

“It’s been on the blade the whole time!” Zelena laughs, delightedly, “Right under your nose! Oh, I suppose it isn’t the Dark One, anymore, is it? Hm? More like the Dark Ones!” She comes around, and leans into Neal’s face, grinning like a demon. “Remember when I bound you in the same body as your father?” she asks, sweetly. “Well, this is just the same. Imagine his face when he finds out! His son, who he died to save, consumed by the same curse that tore the two of you apart all those years ago. This is just too good!”

The memory of Rumpelstiltskin makes Neal sick to his bones with both anger and grief. This will destroy him. His father, the fresh hero, restored to him only hours ago… and now, once again, they are torn apart.

Because of Emma: Emma did this to them, to him. Emma destroyed him for her own selfishness, her own desperation.

This is all her fault.

“You couldn’t even tell me?” he asks, his voice deadly calm, icy. “You didn’t even think you owed me that much? Do my needs mean so little to you, Emma?”

“I wanted to fix it to make up for what I had done before you ever had to know,” Emma tells him, and for a moment she sounds so like Rumpelstiltskin at his worst that he wants to scream, to shout, to rip her apart. He wants to succumb to the darkness now poisoning his veins and destroy her here and now… and with Excalibur in his hands, he could do it.

He could make her kneel. He could snap her neck, and stab her, and do everything he saw his father do in his first true act of vengeance, of cold-blooded murder.

No, he thinks, no! He will not become this, not even to make her pay for what she’s done. He won’t allow the curse to take him too.

“By killing me?” Zelena coos, “Oh, how sweet.”

“It was the only way to destroy the darkness in both of us,” Emma begs, and Neal stares at her, appalled by how twisted she’s become, how far she’s fallen, how ugly she seems to him now knowing what she’s capable of.

One Dark One he loved threw him into a portal; the other turned him into his worst nightmare. Both times he begged for mercy, for their love to matter more than their darkest desires. Both times he failed.

Neal feels his heart harden in his chest, feels his resentment, bitterness, hatred boil to the surface before he can swallow down the bile in his throat.

“You’d buy our freedom with murder, blood on your hands?” he demands, quietly. “After you saw my father do the same? After you hated him for ripping Hook’s heart out, and trying to kill him to buy his freedom from the dagger?”

“This isn’t the same thing!” she cries.

“Why? Because Hook was innocent? You didn’t believe that any more than I did, you only pretend you loved him as an excuse not to admit to loving me.”

“Neal…” she gasps, horrified. “How can you say that? He died-“

“He died trying to cover up yet another woman he’d hurt and left behind for his own selfish ends,” he spits, his rage at the dead man, at Emma’s continued sanctification of his memory, uncontained for the first time. “That man stole my mother, threatened my father, and tried to kill everyone I’ve ever cared about, and he died the way he lived: as a villain.”

“So why wouldn’t you let me kill Zelena to save us both?” Emma asks, coldly. “If Hook’s death wasn’t a loss?”

“Because you can’t buy happiness with blood,” Neal replies. “You of all people know that.”

He looks at her, really looks at her, and for the first time since Neal met her, loved her, all those years ago, he cannot summon up the love for her that’s sustained him for so long. In this moment, this one terrible and finite moment, he hates everything that she is: her selfishness, her isolationism, her desperation to save everyone, her inability to accept it when he’d begged for his death.

“Neal,” she begs. “Please, I couldn’t lose you. You have to understand. Everything I’ve done since has been about saving you.”

“No, you have to understand,” he says, coldly, without remorse. “You lost me the moment you poured darkness into my soul. You lost me the moment my life meant less to you than your selfish heart.”

He drops the sword at her feet; it lands with a metallic clatter.

“Oh, how dramatic,” Zelena laughs, “But wait, there’s more,” she turns to him with a cruel smile, and for once he isn’t afraid of her. For once, Zelena isn’t the person he hates most in the world. “Are you ready to learn what else happened in Camelot?”

“Show me. Nothing can be worse than this. Nothing could be worse than her.”

Emma’s eyes are devastated, heartbroken, as she silently pleads with him not to hate her.

And for once, for the first time ever, Neal doesn’t care.


	11. Broken Heart

Neal is nowhere.

He wonders, for a moment, out of time and out of balance, if he is merely asleep. Has be been drugged? Knocked unconscious? Is this the place between life and death?

Then, slowly, as the darkness around him thickens and swarms, shuddering and oozing around him, daylight begins to trickle through the vines, and he remembers.

He’s been _cursed_.

The first sound ripped from his lungs is an ungodly, unearthly howl, “ _NO!_ ”

But it is too late. Of course it is. He is covered in a heavy cowl, gowned in the same shapeless grey tunic Emma had worn, the same heavy cloak he’d seen his father resurrected in from this very same vault. She’s done it: she’s done the unthinkable, against all logic, all reason, all his begging and his hopes and his desperate desire to die a slow death rather than this.

She’s turned him into the Dark One.

Neal swallows, hard, but the rage and terror and overwhelming agony is too strong, far, far too strong. It overcomes him, overwhelms him, and he clenches his fingers until he cuts his own palms, and howls to the sky. “No, no, NO!” The Dark One coiled in his veins and slithered through his mind, and Neal wants nothing more than to wretch his own guts out, to wrench the curse from his body, no matter the cost.

“Well, all that racket’s not going to help,” a voice, a voice he knows too well, comes from the trees.

Neal whirls to face it, his new eyes unnaturally sharp in the dark woods. His father blinks back at him, but not his father, no, his father is unconscious back in Storybrooke, and Neal almost loses his mind to think of what effect this will have on Rumpelstiltskin. This is his worst nightmare. This is their shared nightmare, and Emma - selfish, helpless, desperate Emma - has made it come to pass.

“You’re not my father,” he snarls back. The scaled creature shrugs, a smug grin on its wicked face. That face destroyed Neal’s life. The day he’d first seen it, victorious over the bodies of the soldiers he’d butchered, was the day his childhood had gone up in smoke. He hates that face; that voice, those theatrical gestures and preening remarks; he hates them more than he hates anything else in the world.

“Clever lad,” the Dark One croons. “You’ve noticed the blinding obvious. I’m not your father, boy, I’m your guide.”

“The same way you guided him?” Neal snaps, stepping forward, off the vault and onto the soft, mossy earth. The creature neither blinks nor falters. It just narrows his eyes in thought, and watched.

“Precisely!” it giggles, all of a sudden, stabbing a sharp finger in Neal’s direction. “Oh, but we’ve no need of introductions, have we my boy? We’ve known each other since you were but a wee lad.”

A shiver runs down Neal’s spine. A spate of memories run through his feverish mind – his father, snarling at his mother’s empty chair, rambling at voices that weren’t there; Rumpelstiltskin before the portal, pleading that he couldn’t let go, his eyes unfocused, his cries aimed not only at his son clasped tight to his hand; and then Emma, mere weeks ago, aiming fireballs at ghosts. Yes, he knows the demon. And the demon, he is coldly certain, knows him.

“Now, I’m not the fateful sort, not often at least,” the demon trills. “But I’d say this was all but fated, written in those shiny stars, so to speak. We’ve been overdue for this moment for some time.”

“Get out of my way,” Neal barges forward, unsurprised when the demon passes through his arm and appears behind him. Too much to hope for to get a good punch in at the creature that thoroughly mangled his life, he supposes. Pity. “I have to find Emma.”

“Do you now?” the creature asks, delightedly. “Marvellous! Wring her neck, won’t you? It is her fault you’re stuck here, with me, after all.”

“I have to fix this,” Neal mutters under his breath, desperation lighting fires in his veins. He marches doggedly through the forest, eyes on his feet. “I have to, I can’t be this, I won’t.”

“Oh, but you will,” the creature croons, before him once again, right in his face. Neal pulls up short, forgetting on instinct that he could walk right through his not-father’s shimmering face. “You’re trapped this way for some time now, I’m afraid. You know the rules, and while dear Merlin did find a way around it for Emma, that method was forfeit when you got involved. And what a bargain that was: she sold her soul to save you, and in the process sacrificed yours. Now you’re both cursed.”

“There’s always a loophole,” Neal shouts. “You taught me that. Always a way around whatever stupid rule is set.”

“Did I say there was not?” the Dark One whines, as if mortally offended. “I’m trying to help you, Bae. What have I ever done but try to protect you? And what have you ever done but ignore me?” He sighs and shakes his head, “Children just won’t listen.”

“You’re not my father,” Neal insists, yet again. “Don’t speak as if you are. You’re the reason we were separated in the first place! You and that stupid dagger!”

“I’m the reason you’re alive, Bae,” the creature reminds him, silkily. “I brought the children home, remember? I kept you safe from harm and poured riches in your lap. I sent you to the world where your love was found and your son was born, and it was I who opened your father’s path home to you. Don’t speak to me as if I’m not your dearest friend.”

“You’re my worst nightmare,” Neal tells it, harshly. “And I won’t do a thing you say.”

He marches through the apparition, unsurprised when it only turns to face his back as he tries desperately to leave it behind. “Oh, not even if it could save you?” the thing asked, in his father’s trilling voice, as if it were an afterthought and not some terrible plan.

“You won’t save me from you, I know that much,” Neal snaps. “You want all the light destroyed. Don’t lie to me and pretend we’re on the same side here."

“Oh but we are,” the creature smiled. “I want what you want.”

“I want you banished forever,” Neal says, refusing to turn around.

“And I want to not be split in two,” the monster replies. “And away from this realm. We can help one another. You can send me to a realm where I can thrive, and you’ll be rid of me forever.”

To Neal’s horror, his shame, his heart lightens just a little, and he feels hope in his chest. Another realm would be fitting: it was his first plan, after all, before it ended up being him banished instead. If he can send the creature to a barren world, somewhere empty and lifeless, where it can do no harm. The Apprentice wanted to put it in the hat and had failed, but another world might contain it where the hat could not.

At once, the plan emerges in his mind, and he can see with perfect clarity what needs to be done. _A lake, a drop of blood, the knife, a simple spell, and then the Underworld can have the Dark One for good. No more passing it around, no more suffering, no more darkness._

“Ah,” the creature says. “You see it. You’re interested.”

“I see what you want me to see,” Neal retorts, but he hears the waver in his own voice, for the magic in his veins – powerful, unfamiliar, terrible, _wonderful_ – sings that this could be the truth.

“Well, I’ve already told you that much, dearie,” the Dark One croons. “You see a possibility, one I can help you attain. We can both have what we want.”

“This is what you said to him,” Neal snarls, through clenched teeth. “You told him you could give him what he wanted, and I ended up stranded and alone.”

“Well, that was your fault, not his,” the voice points out, and Neal whirls to face it and swings a futile, furious fist into the air. The creature melts away from his fist, and reappears behind him. “Over here, dearie!” it laughs, and Neal has to swallow hard to contain his fury as he turns back to face it. “You know I’m right. Your father’s plan, _my_ plan, would have had you safe and warm and rich in a grand palace, the world at your feet, one happy family. It was that fairy who put a new dream in your head, and you know what you were asking him at the portal. I merely… helped him to see what he stood to lose.”

“We’d have been safe.”

“Would you now?” the creature cocks its head in mock consideration. “I think we both know better than that. The portal would never have untethered me from him, only my power. You were lied to by a creature happy to sacrifice a beggar and his son for her own security.”

“I wanted to be free,” Neal replies, coldly. “You swallowed him whole and now you’ve taken my soul too, so don’t tell me it wasn’t your fault.”

“I never said it wasn’t,” the creature smiles. “I simply pointed out that you’ve been lied to, used, and manipulated by every magical force imaginable. I used you, and then the Reul Ghorm, your grandfather, the witch, even your own father… every one of them has used you as a pawn in their plans. Whatever _noble_ little dream you’ve ever had, it’s been corrupted and stolen by someone more powerful. Now, _you_ have the power. _You_ can take what you want.”

“What I want is to be free of you, forever!” Neal cries, carried along by the lilt of its words, the anger roaring and boiling in his blood, desperate to rip the beast to shreds, to tear it into nothing but flesh and blood and sinew and bone. The need for blood is so strong he can taste it in his mouth, his heart pounding in his chest.

“Then _do it_!” the creature screams, suddenly so close Neal can see the flecks of gold on its mottled scales, its mossy teeth bared, its opaque eyes wide and mad. Its voice screams, rebounding through Neal’s head, driving out thought, reason, rationality, hope, and leaving only Neal’s heartbeat, that terrible voice, and the anger that threatens to swallow him whole. “Take what you want, boy, before yet _again_ someone else takes it from you!”

“How?” Neal asks, pleads, _begs_ , helpless in the face of such force, desperate to drive out the noise in his head, at any price, at any cost. “How can I do it? How can I be rid of you?”

“You need to get back to Storybrooke.” The creature withdraws from him, smiling a smug smile, knowing it has won. “Where there is a lake, through which one may open a portal to the Underworld, and summon the ferryman.”

“And you can be banished then?” Neal demands. “I could summon the ferryman, as you say, and finally end this?

“If you so chose,” the creature demurs. “That would certainly be an option. But who knows?” The creature smiles, all pointed teeth and malice. “We could have become friends, by then. You may not want me gone.”

“I’m not my father,” Neal tells it, and starts to walk, resolved this time not to stop, nor to look back, nor to give the creature a moment more’s satisfaction. “And I won’t isolate myself. You’re no friend of mine. I know who my friends are.”

“They all say that,” the creature scoffs. “And they’re all wrong.”

Neal ignores it and keeps walking, refusing to look back. Soon after, feeling the new strength in his body, the magic lending energy he’s never known before, he breaks into a run. He has to find Henry, and the others. Not Emma. Emma, he couldn’t look in the eye. But the others protested this, the others begged her to allow him to die as himself, not live on as the monster he is now sure to become. He has one shot: the banishment, if that can even be done. Then, he supposes, he's back where he was: at the mercy of Excalibur's cut to his neck.

If he can find the others, they have a shot of verifying if the monster is telling the truth. If it is, then they have a way forward. If not… if not, then he doesn't know what comes next.

“Dad?” a voice, far-off and familiar as the sun, comes through the dark trees.

Neal stops and turns toward it, seeking instinctively with magic for his son, “Henry?”

“Dad!” he hears the response, called through the trees, and then Henry appears through the undergrowth, and Neal reaches for him instinctively. “Dad!”

“Henry!” he cries, overjoyed, feeling the anger and power and the darkness that had so easily encroached shrink back as his arms close around his son, and he holds on for dear life. “Oh, God, Henry, I’m so glad to see you.”

“We’re all looking for you,” Henry tells him, pulling back to look his father in the face. “I… mom did it, then?”

Neal looks down at his robe with disgust, “I… yes, she did,” he replied, “The robe gave it away, huh?” Neal shakes all over, using some instinctive magic to change his clothing back to his old, dark coat, and jeans. “But don’t worry, I might have a plan to put this right.”

“A plan?” Henry frowns, “Dad, Merlin says the blades being connected couldn’t kill the Dark One now, mom… mom made it impossible when she saved you.”

“When she turned me into a Dark One, you mean,” Neal crorrects, harshly, evading the question. He will not outright lie to his son, he vows, he won't, he _refuses._

Henry stared at him: he’s never heard that tone from his father before. Neal watches as realisation dawns, as he turns into someone else in his son’s eyes, and his stomach twists and churns with hatred, anger, and disgust. This curse corrupts everything, and Henry will suffer the same fate he did. Neal’s head spins, sick to his stomach. It's all Emma’s fault.

“Dad, you were dying,” Henry pleads. “She had to do something.”

“She didn’t have to do _this_ ,” he growls, past sense or reason on this one, immutable fact. “There are a thousand ways one can freeze or save a man with magic, and she chose this one because it was convenient, and she didn't care about the consequences. Someone has to answer for that.”

“Dad, come on,” Henry’s brows draw together, and he steps back again, away, scared of him. Neal knows the look on his face. It's the exact expression he knows he’d worn, the day his father had returned to their hut and stained the ground with the blood of five soldiers. It is fear, and doubt, and the war between those things and the bravery that love must inspire. “You’re scaring me.”

“I’m sorry,” Neal shakes his head, ashamed of himself, trying desperately to ignore the creature who lingered on the edges of his vision, telling him the boy will never listen, that it is useless to apologise or expect understanding. “I just…”

“I know,” Henry nods, the apology apparently mollifying him, and Neal’s whole body relaxes when his son’s warm hand comes to rest on his shoulder, grounding him with its weight. “I saw mom, remember? But you can fight this. You’re a hero, you’re good, and good always wins.”

Neal grits his teeth and tries to smile, to nod, to believe. The creature lingering over Henry’s shoulder only has shake its head to shatter the whole notion.

 _Good does not always win, Henry,_ Neal thinks. _Strength wins, and the strong have the power to call themselves good._

He’d never have thought such a thing, two hours ago, yesterday, a year or two or ten or a hundred ago. He’d never have thought it in his life; for all that it rinks true now, and settles deep in his bones. Isn't Rumpelstiltskin proof that good does not always win? That good can be weak, by no fault of its own, because the odds are rigged and the dice are loaded? That those good intentions can become evil without ever changing their tune?

“Come on, dad,” Henry takes Neal’s hand without hesitation, and tugs. “We need to get back to Granny’s. With the others there, we can work out a way to fix this.”

“Do you already have Emma?” Neal asks, urgently, as they start to walk. “Is she with them?”

“I don’t know,” Henry admits. “I ran away: was looking for both of you.”

“How did you find me?” Neal stares down at his boy, confused by the whole sudden turn of events, stabilised by the constant touch of his son’s hand. With Henry beside him, Neal can almost think clearly, and the voice is almost silent. “The vault is a day’s walk from the diner.”

“We’re only an hour from the diner, dad,” Henry tells him, gently. “You must have used magic to walk here.”

Neal frowns, not remembering ever reaching for a spell, and looks up at the trees. The creature's gleaming, opaque eyes glint back, and it smile a wide, satisfied smile. “I got you were you wanted to go, didn’t I?” it asks him, softly, as they apparently pass it. “You’re returned to your son. I’m not sure if this is irony or déjà vu. I said the same to your father on his first morning, too.”

“Be quiet,” Neal snaps. “Don’t push me.”

“Dad?” Henry asks, cautiously, and Neal turns back to him in alarm.

“I ah…”

“It’s here, isn’t it?” Henry says then. “I know about it, my mom told me. The voice of the Dark One, talking to you all the time.”

“It is,” Neal admits, feeling the Dark One’s eyes on the back of his head as they walk, trying not to shudder all over or blast out at it with every ounce of strength he has. The thought that the creature does not truly exist _outside_ of his body but _within_  makes every inch of Neal’s skin crawl.

‘Baelfire, Baelfire, Baelfire!’ the call, Emma’s voice through the woods, comes to Neal, although he knows Henry will not hear it. Neal stiffens anyway, the call a distinct tug at his senses but not, he thinks, a compulsive _pull_. He can ignore it. It stands like an open door, a pull of curiosity, a summons he can answer if he chooses, or ignore completely.

“Is he still there?” Henry stops as Neal had, and tries to force his father to focus on him and not that distinct echo. Neal shakes his head.

“No, it’s Emma,” he says. “She’s summoning me.” The call comes again, but Neal doesn't answer, the same as before. He doesn't want to speak to her, to see her, to be forced to hear her relief at his continued survival or her apologies, her explanations, her rationality. He wants none of it. He will fix this mess, _her_ mess, without her help: her help causes only suffering, only pain. “ Do you have Excalibur, Henry?” he asks then, the question suddenly imperative. Henry looks at him speculatively, and then shakes his head.

“We don’t know where it is,” he says. “Maybe Emma knows.”

“Maybe,” he agrees, hoping Henry is wrong, hoping to God that the sword is still at the stables where she inflicted this terrible curse, or trapped back in that stone. They start to walk again, Neal actively blocking that distant call.

The answer as to the sword’s whereabouts comes not five minutes later. “Dark One, I summon thee!”

The voice reverberates through every ligament and sinew of Neal’s body, shuddering and tearing him apart, dragging him through that open door and away from Henry’s surprised cry without any ability to stop it. The smoke that whirls around him is a deep blue, like the sky before the sunset, and for a moment it engulfs him completely, his body no longer his own. He is aware this was his own magic, answering the summons: the compulsion of the dagger complete and absolute.

When he settled he is rigid, with horror and fury both. Emma holds Excalibur high before her, and with it the final, terrifying confirmation of his worst nightmare.

The name on the sword hilt is the most familiar and the most awful word Neal has ever seen.

 _Baelfire_.

The last time he’d seen it written down, it shattered his world. The shock he’d felt then, his identity revealed by August’s typewriter in some nameless back alley, is nothing to what he feels to see it now. The name he’d rejected along with his heritage, his memories, his home and his life before he’d arrived in New York, homeless and alone and free at last from magic. The name that is still his, that will always be his, and which now binds him to the blade.

“There you are,” Emma sighs, and only then did Neal see her behind the blade, and take her in fully. Her white dress and cloak have been replaced by smooth black leather, her hair bleached white, her skin glittering pale as diamonds. She’s done it then: she’s been consumed by the darkness, and made that final descent into her new power. He wonders if she relishes it, if the corruption of his soul brings her any satisfaction.

“How could you?” he demands, his teeth grit against his instinctive fear of the knife in her hands. “Emma, how the hell could you?”

“Neal, you were dying,” Emma bags. “I had to save you, I couldn’t just… I couldn’t let you die like that, not when I could save you. We’ve been through too damn much for it to be over that fast!”

“I _died_ , Emma!” Neal retorts, just as fast, and there's a thrill of satisfaction in his newly blackened soul when she recoils. “You killed me as surely as the knife did. This curse is a death sentence, my death sentence. All you did was prolong the suffering.”

“We can still save us both,” she whisperes, helplessly. “Neal, we don’t have to die like this-“

“We’re finished, Emma,” he tells her, tightly. “Whether we live or die, we’re finished, you and I.”

“I saved you,” she breathes, hopelessly. “Neal I… listen to me!”

He stares at her, his whole focus suddenly narrowed on her without his will, and he lets out a half-scream of frustration, “Don’t you dare command me!” he cries. “Put down the sword, then maybe we’ll talk!”

“Sorry, sorry!” Emma says, as if she’d stepped on his foot and not removed all agency or free will from his mind with a careless word. She sets the sword carefully between them on the cold, dark earth, and faces him. “Let’s talk.”

“You knew my history with this curse,” he tells her. “You knew it destroyed my life. It took my childhood, my father, my world, and then it took the woman I loved. Everything in my life, every hardship, every nightmare, every bad memory and every loss has been at the hands of this curse. But I stood by you, when you took it on to save Regina, of all people. I made her drop the knife and never use it. I talked to Henry, your parents, anyone who said a word against you, because I believed in you. I believed your light could destroy the dark that blighted my whole existence.”

“It can,” she pleads, her face softening, but he feels no movement to sympathy or forgiveness. “It still can, Neal, I just… it doesn’t mean anything if you had to die to do it.”

“You don’t understand,” he shakes his head, his voice deathly quiet. “You’re not listening to me. I stood by you because I loved you, and I had faith you were stronger than the darkness was. I would have died willingly to see that curse destroyed. My father took it on to keep me alive. I would have been satisfied to die to destroy it. And instead, you infected me, corrupted me, violated me when I begged you not to.”

“Neal-“

“No!” he holds up a hand, warning her back, “No, you don’t get to explain yourself. You don’t get to tell me how your fear of loss was more important than my ability to decide my own fate. You don’t get to tell me your pain was more important than mine.”

“What about Henry?” she demands then. “You’d leave him fatherless to prove a point?”

“I’d rather he saw his father die a hero, than live on as a monster. Because make no mistake, Emma, that’s where we are now. We’re monsters, the two of us: you for violating every cell of my body with this curse, and me for what you’ve turned me into. The time for grey areas has gone, and you killed it.”

“You know that’s bullshit, Neal! Think of how we felt when Henry said the same stupid things about dying as a hero! The _Dark One_ is making you say these things,” she tells him. “It’s corrupting your thoughts, making you lash out at me. I am not your enemy!”

“Oh?” he all but smiles at that, at the absurdity of it. “Then who is?”

“The Dark One!” she cries. “You saw what it did to your father, what he was willing to do to save you! How can you forgive him, understand him, and not me?”

That pulls him up short, and Neal stares at her for a long moment, turning the argument around and around in his head, seeking flaws. “I… I was still me, even after everything he did. I got to choose how it affected me. You turned me into something I hate because you were too selfish to let go.”

“And he abandoned you in a strange world, homeless and alone, because he was too selfish to hold on,” she reminds him. “You told me he never would have done that without the demon in his head. I panicked, Neal, I just… I couldn’t lose you. I _can’t_ lose you.” She steps closer again, and this time he lets her. “Please, Neal… we can fix this, together.”

Her hand slips into his, and squeezes experimentally. “I made a mistake, and I’m _sorry_ , but at least you’re still alive,” she said, her eyes meeting his with such a plea that for a moment, a crucial moment, his defences wavered.

“You wouldn’t have done this… if you were yourself?” he asks.

“I don’t think so, no,” she promises, and somehow her uncertainty eases him better than an easy blanket sentiment would have. “I… I love you so much, Neal. I panicked.”

“You tore me away from Henry,” he tells her, after a long moment. “Summoning me here I mean, and you scared him. You scared me.”

“I’m sorry,” she sighs. “You just weren’t responding to the summons.”

“I _chose_ not to respond,” he corrects. “And you have got to respect that. You of all people should know that, Emma!”

“I’m _sorry_!” she cries, releasing his hand and stepping back, her face distraught. “I don’t know what to do here, Neal! I’m not me and you’re not you and it’s my fault, it’s all my fault, and I’m out of my depth here.”

“ _You’re_ out of your depth?” he demands. “Come the hell on, Emma, you haven’t a clue what this curse can do when it really digs into your soul. We have to get it out of us before we become the demons it wants us to be.”

“And how do we do that?” she asks, desperately. “How? Because Merlin basically said all hope was lost when I… when I did this to you.”

He regards her, trying to decide whether to confide his plan to her, to tell her what the Dark One had told him. The urge to hide it is almost overwhelming, the fear that she’ll disagree, call it dangerous or reckless or simply reveal she doesn't want to be rid of it at all, is undeniable. “We have to get back to Storybrooke,” he says, at last, deciding to tell her later, when he's sure it will work. “Maybe my father can help.”

“Your father?” Emma frowns. “He started this whole mess!”

“You can’t use him as a defence one moment, and then blame him the next!” Neal cries. “Pick a side!”

“He tried to suck me into a hat and sacrifice me for power!” Emma retorts. “And you weren’t exactly forgiving when he came back!”

“And you sacrificed my soul against my will,” he says. “You haven’t a leg to stand on anymore, Emma. This is the worst thing you’ve ever done.”

“Neal-“

“We have to fix this, Emma,” he says. “I’m going to fix it. With or without you.”

She isn't going to help: he can see it in her eyes. She doesn't trust Rumpelstiltskin, she thinks all hope is lost, and worst of all, she wants to do this all on her own.

Neal crouches to the ground, and picks up the sword, watching as Emma’s face fell slack with shock. “I don’t hate you,” he tells her, tightly, “But I won’t let you screw this up again.”

And then, with an instinctive rush of magic, she is gone, and he is outside Granny’s.

“Well,” the Dark One grins at him, “That was fun.”

“It’s her fault I’m stuck with you,” he snaps at the demon. “So yeah, my trust in her is a little low right now.”

“You could just run her through, you know,” it suggests, nastily, and Neal shudders again to hear such cruelty in his father’s voice. “Save us both some trouble.”

“I’m not killing anyone!” he tells the creature.

“ _Yet_ ,” the creature corrects. “I’ll give you time to rethink that one.”

“Bae?” Belle interrupts their little fight, coming out of the diner with her cloak wrapped around her. “Bae!”

She flies into his arms, and he hugs her tight, something about her presence soothing the monster in his head. The Dark One glares at her, such hatred in his twisted face that it almost hurts to look. It is wrong to see the face of the man who loves Belle so very much look at her with such disdain. But then, this is the woman who’d almost defeated him with nothing but a kiss.

“I’m so glad you’re alive!” she cries. He grimaces.

“She made me the Dark One, Belle,” he tells her, grimly. She nods.

“I guessed as much,” she says. “I… Gods, this is going to kill Rumple. But at least you’re alive. You’re alive and that’s better than any alternative.”

“Is it?” he demands. “I… I really don’t know about that. I think I’d rather be dead than have this… thing slithering through my veins and twisting my thoughts. It took my papa and now it’s taken me too…”

For the first time, he feels tears prick his eyes, and he brushes them away angrily, the curse rebelling against such a show of weakness. Belle’s eyes are soft, her mouth curved in understanding, and he sees not a hint of disgust or doubt in her face. She reaches up and takes his head in her hands, bringing him down to her and kissing his forehead. She's so small, so young, and yet in that moment she is so warm and maternal he wishes he could just curl up and rest his head in her lap like a child. “You’re going to be alright,” she promises, “We’re going to save you. Just hold on, okay? It’s going to be alright.”

He nods, trying desperately to believe her, “Is Merlin inside?” he asks. Belle frowns, and nods.

“He said he was recording a message,” she says. “Something about a worst case scenario. That’s why I came outside. Everyone else is out there looking for you, and… and Excalibur,” her eyes land at last on the sword at Neal’s feet, dropped when he’d hugged her, and he catches it up in a moment, unwilling or unable to leave it when she’s noticed it. “You have it,” she said, softly. He nodded.

“Emma used it to summon me, and… I’ve had the compulsion before, Belle. When papa and I shared a body, I felt it whenever Zelena compelled him, even when he was the one looking out. It’s the worst feeling, your body no longer yours, even your mind trying to give in to another’s control. She used it on me because I refused to speak to her any other way.”

“She’s in the same place you are, Bae,” she reminds him, gently. “And… and while I know how you feel, I know Rumple would agree this is better than what could have happened.”

“She couldn’t have left me in stasis, like papa?” he asks, helplessly. “Or used some magic to hold the wound closed until we could find a cure? Anything, anything but this?”

“She was desperate,” Belle shrugs. “And you’re strong, Bae. You can fight it like no one else can, you know it, you know not to listen to it.”

Over her shoulder, the Dark One winks at him, a smug, sickening grin on his lips. _Too late_ , Neal thinks, _I’ve already listened to it; I already gave in_.

“Bae?” Belle asks, confused, and glances over her shoulder, seeing straight through the creature glaring daggers at her back. “What is it?”

“I can see it, Belle,” he tells her, his voice low and harsh. “The Dark One, in the shape of my father, glaring at you. Do you know how much it hates you?”

Belle shudders all over, her face clouded with a fierce anger rarely seen on her smooth, gentle features, “Does it know how much I hate it in return?” she asks him. “It took your father but it also took my love: it waited for his weakness after Zelena and it stole his soul. My marriage is a wreck because of that demon.”

“Then why are you so certain I should be breathing right now?” he demands. She just shrugs, and smiled the smile of a woman with a secret weapon.

“Because I know how it can be defeated,” she replies. “Love is stronger than this curse, Bae, and if you know anything, it’s how to love. Don’t let go of that, not for a moment, don’t you dare. Nothing is more important. Your father… Rumple forgot that, and it ruined everything. He burned our happy ending to the ground because he thought safety and power mattered more.”

“The love caused that fear, not the other way around.”

“No, Bae, it didn’t,” she shakes her head. “And you know it didn’t. The curse blocked it, and he felt too alone to fight back, even with both of us right beside him. Now it might be too late. I won’t lose you as well as him, and I won’t let him lose you, either. I think that would truly kill him.”

Neal nods, holding onto her words like a life raft, the words of the only woman alive who may understand this better than he does. He loves his father, and it destroyed him to watch him turn into the monster he had, but he’d been a child, unable to see the flawed man behind every action. Belle only knows Rumpelstiltskin as an adult, with clear eyes and a bright heart, and she’s had more time and space to create understanding than Neal ever had. He’d done what children do: he’d run away. Belle stood her ground, for as long as she could bear, far longer than he had. Belle had been able to look the curse in the eye, draw a line in the sand, and say ‘this far, but no further’.

How hard could it have been, Neal wonders, being married to the Dark One? As Rumpelstiltskin’s child, he’d been allowed to hate him and run away, because underneath he’d always known he loved his father, and always known who he’d been before the Dark One snuffed out his light. He’d held onto that knowledge, that the cruelty hid good intentions, that the monstrosity was born out of fierce, abiding love.

What can it have been like for Belle, to only know the monster? And worse, to finally reveal the good man behind it all, only to have him snatched away, twisted and warped yet again, and this time destroying them both from within?

Neal has never understood any of that before. Now, with the darkness twisting in his veins and digging its sharp claws into his soul, he understands his father all too well, and with it comes a deep respect for the woman who’d held on for as long as she had. And then, who’d been able to let go when she had to, even when it was painful and cruel and messy, even when it killed her to do it.

Emma hadn’t been able to do that. And now, Neal is paying the price.

“Come on,” Belle says, taking his hand, firmer and surer than Emma’s grip had felt. “Let’s talk to Merlin.”

“Belle, I…” Neal takes a deep breath, and she pauses, one step ahead of him, looking him dead in the eyes.

“You’re keeping a secret from me,” she says bluntly, shocking him into silence. Her eyes narrow. “I’ve learned from the last few months of my life, you see. Rumple always had that tortured look, and I took it for trauma but it was also secretive. Your eyes do the same narrow thing when you’re hiding something. Tell me everything, or I can’t help you.”

“I had an idea… well,” he sighs, and sags, waiting for the disapproval when she dismisses it out of hand. “I was _given_ an idea. The Dark One wants to leave our realm, you see. It told me how to open a portal, back in Storybrooke. I can conduct all the darkness into the Charon, the ferryman, to carry it down to the Underworld and out of our world forever.”

“The Dark One gave you this plan?” Belle checks. Neal nods. She considers it, thinking it through, and then she nods, resolved.

“It wants you to open the portal,” she says, at last. “That’s all we know for sure. The motivation and what it plans to do afterward, that’s all just speculation. The only instruction its given you is to open the portal, so that’s its endgame. Come on,” she started to drag him up the slope to Granny’s, and he went willingly, utterly dumbfounded by how easily she’d unravelled the layers of the Dark One’s plot. “We need to ask Merlin what it means.”

“If you’re hearing this,” Merlin’s voice comes through as they opened the door, “Then things are worse than I feared. The Dark One has found me!” he cries, afraid. He backs away from his cauldron, as Neal and Belle enter the room.

Neal holds the sword hard in his right hand, the left gripped in Belle’s. “You don’t have to be afraid!” Belle assures him, holding up a hand. “We just need to talk to you.”

“He’s the Dark One, Belle,” Merlin warns her. “I have foreseen this confrontation.”

“This isn’t a confrontation!” she cries, looking to Neal for confirmation. But Neal’s eyes are set on a woman behind Merlin, green and scaled as his father had been, and perhaps beautiful, before she had become so. She wears the same cloak he had when he emerged from the vault, and she presses a finger to her lips, stepping close to Merlin, and to his cauldron.

“Then why are you here?” Merlin asks, cagily. Belle squeezes Neal’s hand, but Neal shakes his head, bound to silence by the woman creeping around the cauldron.

Belle explains what the Dark One had said to Neal, but she is drowned out, as in a slow, melodious voice, the woman begins to speak.

“You can reach the other world, your world, you know,” she says, and then Neal knows who she was, the name filtering through his mind like an echo. Nimue: the first, the creator of the curse, the original Dark One. “And you don’t have to kill Emma, or Henry to do it. You’re looking at the thing I love most, my Merlin. His heart could cast the curse. All you have to do is crush it, and throw it into the cauldron: my magic – _your_ magic – will do the rest.”

“The Underworld?” Merlin is shaking his head, but Neal is only half listening, his body utterly attuned to Nimue’s will. “You cannot allow it,” Merlin says “The Dark One won’t be banished, it will rise out of the lake and consume the world. I should have known this was her plan… but the visions were so unclear.”

“Go on,” Nimue tempts. “I’m in your head, your blood, your bones… and I have been since you were only a boy. I was always your destiny, Neal, your destiny to be my last host, to take me to the finish line. It requires only one more sacrifice, and that of a man who failed you, and your father, and your true love. Merlin knew Emma was all alone in the world, and yet did nothing. He could have banished the darkness from your father or reunited you earlier, without anyone having to be hurt or killed, but he sat by and did nothing. My abiding, helpless love for him can help end this completely. _You_ could end this completely. Just crush his heart, and all can be well.”

Neal tries not to listen, to think on her words: tries to focus on Belle and Merlin’s discussion of binding spells, and how it could be possible to banish the demon. But she is right, of course she is right. Nimue loves Merlin, he can feel it, and she is one Dark One and every Dark One. Merlin had allowed his father to be twisted and corrupted, not even pushing his Apprentice to help when he could have. He’d treated Rumpelstiltskin as a villain, and thus condemned his victims to their fates. Who would miss him?

“No!” Neal cries, wrenching away from his thoughts, horrified to find his arm already half-extended toward Merlin’s chest. “No, I… I won’t…”

“Won’t what?” Belle stands at his side, her hand on his arm, “Neal, what’s the matter?”

“She could do as well, you know,” The Dark One is at his ear now, his scaled father returned, “I loved her as much as I loved you, you could crush her heart and that would be enough.”

That is what broke through the haze, “No, I won’t, I cant!” he shouts, and tears away from her hold on his arm. She follows him, trying to soothe him, to talk him down in those low, loving tones.

“Go on,” the voice tempts, “One tug, and you could blame it on Emma. Your father will never know: Belle died in Camelot, how sad, what a shame. He’ll have you: he’ll get over her. She left him anyway remember? You’d be saving him from a callous, uncaring lover, and a string of broken hearted attempts to win her unkind heart back.”

“I won’t kill her,” he grinds out, the creature peering over Belle’s shoulder, pointing to her heart with eager fingers. “I won’t!”

“Kill me?” Belle recoils, shaking her head. “Bae… why would you kill me?”

“To cast the curse,” Merlin explains, softly. “He needs the heart of the thing he loves most, except he’s the Dark One, so any Dark One’s beloved will suit. You’re as good as Emma, or Henry, or me.”

“Bae, no,” Belle says, firmly, taking his free hand in hers once more. “You can fight this, you have to. Rumple fought it, for centuries he fought it, and so has Emma. So can you. Just breathe, Bae. You’re loved, and there’s _always_ another way.”

“There isn’t!” the Dark One cried, giggling. “Kill her, or you’ll be the Dark One forever, boy… well, until your heart turns black as coal, and just as hard. Then it’ll crumble into ash, and your body will be all mine, my puppet, my _host_ , for all eternity. This is the only way to save your soul.”

“No!” he shouts, the urge to kill her, to tear out her heart and crush it to save himself, almost subsuming him. The Dark One wants her dead even more than it does Merlin, and the blinding desperation almost drives him to do it.

He does the only think he can think of: he blasts her away from him, back onto the floor, and knocks her unconscious.

“Neal?” Emma’s voice cuts through the tense silence. “What the hell is happening here?”

“I have to cast the curse,” he explains, through grit teeth, breathing hard, his eyes on Belle’s unconscious body. “It wanted me to use Belle, but apparently Merlin will do.” His eyes set on the sorcerer, knowing that in a choice between his beloved stepmother and the useless wizard, he’ll kill the latter to save the former in a heartbeat.

“Don’t kill him!” Emma cries, flying across the room to stop him, but he holds up Excalibur to bar her way.

“I’ll use this,” he tells her, shaking hard. “I don’t want to, I really, really don’t, but I will. If I have to. This curse has to end, the monster has to be destroyed, and I will do it if no one else will.”

“It wants you to kill, Neal,” Emma says, urgently. “That’s how it gains a hold on you, corrupts you. You can’t fight it with bloody hands.”

“We can’t get to Storybrooke any other way,” he tells her. “And you can’t talk about clean hands anymore, Emma! I know what you did to Violet, now, it’s all in my head, and I know what you’ve done to me.”

“No one’s dead by my hand, and Merlin is an innocent man, Neal,” Emma pleads, her hand covering his on the sword hilt, easing it down. “You know that. Two wrongs don’t make right.”

“We have to cast it somehow,” he tells her, shakily. “We have to… Merlin’s seen it, it’s the only way.”

“Merlin?” Emma’s frosted brows draw together. “Is this true?”

“Emma, in all the paths I saw for you… this was the darkest. The curse requires a terrible price, but without it you will remain in this realm forever.”

“And what then?”

“Then… then a terrible price must be paid. Someone always has to die.”

“Then let it be me,” Neal says. “I was supposed to die anyway, and I can’t live like this…” his eyes fall back to Belle’s body on the floor, only sleeping thank the Gods, but only just. “Emma, don’t make me be this person. I can’t do it… I’m not strong enough. Please, undo what you did.”

“I won’t kill you!” she shakes her head, her voice wet and choked, desperate. “Neal, I can’t, I won’t. I won’t use you for this.”

“Someone has to die, Emma!” Neal cries, “You heard him! Let it be me!”

“No… no…” Emma's face contorts as she thinks hard, trying desperately to fix a mess she cannot resolve. “I… my parents did it!” she says, inspiration striking. “I’ll share my heart with you, and use yours for the Curse.”

“Two Dark Ones sharing a heart,” Merlin frowns, “Emma, this is a bad idea. It will take only half as long for you both to be consumed by darkness, and then the Dark One will have two vessels without humanity or mercy.”

“Then we’ll have to beat it quickly,” Emma says, with a terrifying resolution.

“I’ll have to stop you,” Merlin tells her, gravely. “It can’t be allowed to have that power, the opportunity you would give it.”

“There’s no other way,” Emma argues, “you said it yourself. And if you’re not with me, you’re against me.”

He takes a deep breath, and sighs, regaining his composure. “If you will not stop then I will have to stop you,” he says, and turns his eyes to the sword still clutched in Neal’s hand. He waves a weary arm, and with the last of his magic, Merlin mutters, “Back from whence you came.”

Neal jumps, as to his horror Excalibur is engulfed in smoke, and then his hand is empty. In the centre of the diner now stands a large stone, flat at the base, with Excalibur trapped in its core. Returned to the stone; out of their hands.

“I still have the dagger!” Emma cries, furious, rounding on Merlin. “You cannot hold us back that easily!”

“I’m defenceless now, Emma, that magic drained me,” he tells her, his level voice betraying only a hint of fear. “Killing me will only make things worse for you.”

“Who said I’d kill you?” she asks, and waved a hand, summoning the Dark One dagger. She kneels to Belle’s side, brandishing it, and Neal stepped forward.

“What the hell are you doing?” he demands. “Making _another_ Dark One?”

“No.” She lifts Belle’s sleeve and makes a shallow cut to her arm, just enough to leave two drops of blood on the blade, before healing it. Then she straightens, and shows Merlin the knife. “The blood of a fallen hero,” she tells him. “Every spell needs a memorable detail.”

“No!” Merlin cries, but it is too late. Emma reaches out both of her hands toward the sorcerer, and her face contorts with effort as she summons a terrible spell that rings through the air like a thunderclap. From her hands come two bursts of light: one bright white, from the tip of the knife, Belle’s blood; the other from Emma’s palm, sickly, thick and deep black.

The magic rips through the air, engulfing Merlin, and he gives a sharp cry that was quickly swallowed up in the magic. Neal watches, horrified and dumbfounded, as Merlin’s arms are dragged up by the mess of magic and light, and spread up, and up, and out, becoming tree branches as his body twists into the thick trunk of an oak tree, his legs spreading to become roots.

Neal gapes, terrified by what had just happened, the power and the ruthlessness of Emma Swan without her soul, as she looks on her work with a satisfied nod.

“I said I wouldn’t kill him,” Emma says, grimly, stepping over the roots. “I never said I would let him stand in my way.”

“You’re with me, then?” Neal asks. “You’ll open the Underworld, seal it away forever?”

“I’ll find a way to save us both,” she swears. “And I know that way exists only in Storybrooke. There’s nothing left for us in Camelot.”

Neal looks at the sword in his hand, and at Emma, and shakes his head. “You lied to me,” he says, softly. “You said you’d never have done this to me if you were yourself, but what you just did to Merlin… you used Belle’s blood to seal him back in his tree, Emma,” he breathes. “That’s dark, dark magic.”

“That’s necessary, Neal,” she says. “Like what I did to you, and what I did to Violet. We’re survivors, you said that to me yourself. I lost you, and then I lost Graham, and I lost Hook, and even goddamn Walsh, and somehow in the fray I found you again. You’re the love of my life, Neal, and like hell am I losing you to _anything_.”

“If you split our hearts, you have no idea if it will work,” he warns her, scared of her intensity, but some part of him, terrible and black and not at all his, is pleased by her devotion. “It might kill us both.”

“It can’t,” she tells him. “We’re Dark Ones, whatever else we won’t die from this.”

“Death isn’t the worst thing,” he says, grimly. “You of all people know that. I’m living proof.”

“I saved you, Neal,” she replies, simply. “Whether or not you care is irrelevant. I saved you. And I’m going to keep saving you.”

With that, she plunges her hand into his chest, and rips the heart from it. It is clear, pure, Neal could see: only a tinge of black at the edges yet.

Then she crushes it into the cauldron beside the tree that was Merlin. He feels the world turn black as his body sinks to the floor, and he knows no more.


	12. Blessed Blades

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Okay so this is where we go rogue, hence the different chapter title. I will do a straight ‘Swan Song’ rewrite as a remix at some point in the near future, but this is the last chapter of Burning Bright and I wanted to give it a satisfactory ending. So this is total canon-divergence. Thank you to everyone who’s been following this fic!

Regina’s house is dark, save for a light in the highest window. At one in the morning, the sun nowhere to be seen, no one should be up. But Regina had asked Granny to keep an eye on Henry and Roland, while Robin has responsibility for his new daughter. It seems no one was sleeping tonight.

Neal is in Henry’s bedroom without another thought. As he’d suspected, his son is wide-awake, reading his storybook, desperate to find any answers at all that could help. There’s a stack of other books – the Once and Future King, the Brothers Grimm, reference materials perhaps – on Henry’s bedside. But it’s that old tome, the broad, leather-bound book that had lead them all home, that is spread out on the bed beside him. “Hey, kid,” Neal murmured. Henry’s head jerks up.

“Dad!” he hisses, grinning. “I didn’t hear you come in! What’s happening? No one’s checked in for hours!”

“It doesn’t matter, Henry,” Neal shakes his head, taking a seat on his son’s bed, his feet suddenly aching, his back breaking with the effort of keeping his head up and a normal expression in place. “I just wanted to make sure you were alright.”

“What do you mean it doesn’t matter?” Henry asks. “What happened to my mom? To grandpa? To Arthur? No one is telling me anything, and Granny’s watching the door so I can’t break out. How’d you get in?”

Neal pinches the bridge of his nose – was it really just twenty-four hours since he’d left here fuming over what had happened with Violet? What a difference a day makes.

Neal forces a grin, “I’m a thief, remember? I have this place wired. And don’t worry, papa and Belle are fine,” Neal assures him. “Arthur’s locked up. It’s… it’s all over, Henry. It’s all gonna be fine.”

It is all going to be fine. The moment he reaches the lake – the moment he has the courage to do what needed to be done, to die for this, the moment he can find it within him to let it happen – then it will all be over. Henry will be safe. Emma will be cured. His father will know he’d died for a noble purpose. He just needs to see his child again, one last time. He just needs one more moment where the world still spins on its axis, and he is still a father, and Henry doesn’t know what he has become. 

“But my mom is still the Dark One?” Henry frowns. “What about Merlin?”

“They’ll find a way to contact him,” Neal promises, remembering the spell, half of Emma’s heart in his chest, and Merlin’s body spreading into branches, sealed with Belle’s blood. Emma knows. Emma will save the sorcerer, the moment she can. It will be all right: he can save everyone. All it will cost him is this moment: him and his son, his arm around Henry’s shoulders, the boy expecting a future that will never come.

That ‘s the role of a father: Neal learned that on main street in broad daylight, when the dagger that is now a sword had slid between his grandfather’s ribs and into his father’s body, and killed them both. Rumpelstiltskin had found the strength to do this: Neal can finish what he started. He can make that sacrifice and all the pain and blood that followed worthwhile. He can do for Henry what Rumpelstiltskin tried to do for him, and make the world safe and sound once more, as he deserves.

“Dad, is everything okay?” Henry asks. “You’re acting weird.”

“I’m just… worried about your mom,” Neal lies. “I’ll rest easier when she’s safe. But it’ll only be a few hours now. We recovered some of what we forgot in Camelot, we know what to do now.”

“What did you find?” Henry asks, excitedly. Neal gives a cryptic smile he knows his father would recognise; it comes all too easily to his face now.

“Merlin’s alive,” he obfuscates. “And it’s all going to be alright.”

Henry frowns again, and for an insane moment Neal worries he’ll be discovered. Then the boy’s face clears, and he shrugs: for a kid raised by Regina Mills, the son of Emma Swan, he is all too trusting sometimes. “Can I get a hug, kid?” Neal asks, and Henry nods. He wraps his arms around his father’s middle, and for a moment he’s two years younger, and Neal is just getting to know his son, and everything looks like it might work out. 

He should have known better, then. He should have taken Emma and Henry and run from Storybrooke when he’d had the chance.

Neal holds onto Henry for dear life, cupping his dark head against his chest, his arm secure around his son’s back, as if he can hold him like this forever: as if he can keep him safe.

“I love you, Henry,” he murmurs into his son’s dark hair. “I’ll always love you.”

“Dad, wh-“ Henry starts, but Neal shushes him with a finger to his lips, hearing Granny’s voice down the hall.

“I gotta go, kid,” he says, swallowing hard around the lump in his throat as he had to pull back, let go. The Dark One has been silent in his head while he’s had contact with his son. He almost wants that voice now: anything to drown out the heavy, aching grief in his throat and stomach. “Watch out for your mom for me, ok?”

“I will, I… dad what’s happening?”

Neal shakes his head, “Go to sleep,” he says, without even trying to answer the question. “You’ll need your strength. We all will.”

And with that, he creeps out onto the landing, and vanishes in a cloud of smoke.

After that, Neal walks all night.

He doesn’t know where he’s going, nor does he care. For all he knows he’s done ten circuits of Storybrooke’s ill-defined perimeter by daybreak. One foot, and then the other, and then the first, and repeat, over and over, the monotony and the aching in the soles of his feet dulling to a kind of comforting hum.

He doesn’t know what to do next. 

He hadn’t known when he’d left Emma’s stark, nightmarish home, Zelena’s taunts fresh in his ears. If he’d seen the Dark One, the voice that had almost made him kill Belle in a desperate fit, he hadn’t noticed. Nimue, his father’s scaled counterpart, whatever other form the thing could take: none of them had appeared before him in the night. He knows even less now with his encounter with Henry playing over and over in his memory. Could that really have been the last time he’d ever speak to his son? How can he shoulder such a burden, magic or no, strength or no?

“Henry will replay that conversation over and over for the rest of his life,” he murmurs to no one, as he paces through the forest. “He’ll wonder if he should have known. He’ll wonder if he could have stopped this.”

God knows Neal had done the same thing when he’d looked back on those final days with his father, before they’d parted ways in the wood, and Rumpelstiltskin had returned a monster. He’d wondered for decades, centuries, if he could have said or done anything to change it. Only Henry, knowing Henry, seeing Henry for what he was, the glorious product of those terrible days, had been enough to silence those questions for good.

“He’ll know you died a hero,” Nimue’s voice is low, soft, comforting. No longer does the Dark One send his father’s scaled face to taunt him. Now he’s steeling his courage to do as it bids him, and it sends something easier to stomach, a kinder face, so far as Nimue can be called comforting. “He’ll know you did the right thing, that you freed us all.”

“He’ll know he lost me,” Neal tells her. “So will my father. They’ll never forgive themselves.”

“They’ll know you did what was right,” Nimue soothes. “Did you blame your father for dying to save you all from Pan? They’ll forgive themselves, and you, when I’m finally gone from their lives.”

He nods to that, and keeps walking. Nimue vanishes from view, allowing him to stew and think alone. She only appears, it seems, when his courage wavers.

He wants to do this in daylight: that, at least, he’s certain of. He will not die in the dark, in woods that look so much, sometimes, like Neverland. He’s lived too long in the dark, and now the dark lives in him. He wants to die, at least, in the light. 

He walks miles through the woods, and he remembers his village, blood spilled on the grass, crying women and defeated old men: another child stolen. The curse had allowed his father to put a stop to that, but at the cost of everything else he held dear.

What will the curse cost him to do the same thing? What will he become, what will he be capable of, if he takes the bargain it had offered him back in Camelot?

Emma had done something for him, at least, in wiping his memories without his consent or his request. She had bought the part of his brain still functioning a few precious days to think, and think it apparently had. The Dark One leaves him to his thoughts, and Neal appreciates that, if nothing else.

Sometimes he walks by the lake where Robin had almost been taken, and he sees the rippling, dark water, the moon high on the surface. One drop of blood – his blood, his father’s, close enough – will open a portal to Hell. One drop of blood and the curse could be banished forever.

Sometimes he’s on Main Street, magic shielding him from the view of those still searching for him. He isn’t ready to be found, nor is he ready for whatever comes next. He shouldn’t have been surprised, he thinks, when come morning he finds himself outside his father’s shop again, this time with his hand on the doorknob. He’s walked all night in a daze, and something – primal, instinctive, the blurred line between what was Neal and what was the Dark One – had drawn him back here. Back to his father, and back to whatever’s left of home.

He doesn’t call out, despite the main room being empty. Not everyone had walked all night, and not everyone is sleepless by nature.

Neal pauses on the threshold of the back room as he takes in what lay beyond. Rumpelstiltskin lies on his back, still dressed in his fine suit, with Belle sprawls over his front, her head pillowed on his chest. They’re dressed to walk out the door at any moment, and they’re fast asleep.

He feels something unfurl inside him, to see that: hope, maybe, or satisfaction. He’d been half afraid he’d return and find Belle gone, considering the doubts she’d had throughout their Camelot adventures and afterward, and considering the pain his father has caused her. Neal is under no illusions: if the curse doesn’t kill him, the cut on his neck surely will. He can’t bear the thought of leaving his poor, shattered father alone in the word.

“Bae?” Rumpelstiltskin’s eyes blink open, and his sitting up startles Belle awake. 

“I’m sorry,” Neal murmurs. “I… I didn’t want to disturb you.”

“No, no, of course not,” Rumpelstiltskin clambers to his feet and makes his way to Neal without hesitation, taking his son’s hands in his own. Neal bears the weight of his father’s poor balance easily. Strength is part and parcel of his curse – and to think, he’d assumed worry and adrenaline had caused his insomnia and his physical abilities. “Regina… she came by,” Rumpelstiltskin explains, his face creased with pain and worry and yes, there it is, desperation. He’ll do anything to save him, as ever, as always. Coming here was a mistake, but Neal can’t imagine leaving his father always wondering why he hadn’t come home, this one last time. “I… I’m so sorry, my boy.”

Neal is in his father’s arms in a moment, and hugs him tight, clinging like a child afraid of the dark. “I can’t believe it,” Rumpelstiltskin murmurs. “I… oh, Bae.”

“It’s alright, papa,” Neal lies, unable to stomach his father’s tears, swallowing hard. He meets Belle’s gentle, direct gaze, and knows she at least is not convinced. “I… it’s alright.”

“We’ll save you,” Rumpelstiltskin vows, pulling back a little. “Bae, whatever it takes, whatever you need we’ll do it. I won’t… we can’t…”

“I know, papa,” Neal nods. “I know. You’d do anything.”

“Was this the cause of Emma’s plan, then?” Rumpelstiltskin asks, and Neal can see the pieces being put together in his mind. “Who was to be the vessel?”

“Zelena,” Neal replies shortly.

“The vessel?” Belle blinks, stepping closer. “Vessel for what?”

“There is a very dark spell,” Rumpelstiltskin explains, heavily, “That would allow the Dark One to be channelled through Excalibur and into a vessel. Excalibur could then be used to kill that vessel, and the darkness with it. I assume this was Emma’s plan, since…”

“Since she made me a Dark One too,” Neal completes, softly, and watches his father swallow hard. “Yes, it was. She was trying to save us both.”

“I should have let her,” Rumpelstiltskin mutters. “Helped her, even. Two birds, one stone. What a fool I was not to see it. I… I couldn’t even see it in my own son.”

“It’s alright, papa,” Neal murmurs, drawing his father close again, “No one knew. How would you have known?”

There’s no need for him to know about the cut, the bleeding out: the death he will inevitably suffer even if the curse were lifted. No need at all.

“No!” Belle cries, staring at them both in horror. “Whatever Zelena’s done, she’s a mother now, and heroes don’t kill regardless of what-“

“Imprisonment,” Neal begins, unable to take her childlike moralising, his voice slow and soft, inexorable. “Kidnap, torture, rape, attempted murder, actual murder, child abduction, attempted child sacrifice… need I continue?”

“Murder,” Belle retorts, hotly, “Imprisonment, kidnap, torture, and deception – all crimes Rumple has committed! We’re not sacrificing him!”

“Zelena isn’t cursed!”

“Zelena shouldn’t die to save someone else!”

“To save Bae, yes, she should!” Rumpelstiltskin roars, rounding on her. “How are – how can you be this blind, Belle?”

“You’re a hero now, Rumple!” Belle replies, undaunted. “You can’t sacrifice her in cold blood!”

“What part of doing anything to save my son have you misunderstood?” he snaps back. “That was never the curse, my dear, that was always me.”

Neal opens his mouth to speak, but then, out of nowhere, a wave of magic passes over them – magic he recognised. He closes his mouth, and watches the same spell Zelena had used to open the memories in the dream catcher spread across the whole town. Memories restored – even Belle’s, especially Belle’s.

Belle blinks, shaking her head, realisation finally dawning. She looks at him now with new eyes, soft and full of grief. “Oh, Bae,” she breathes, and he knows she knows what comes next.

“Could you tell him, please?” he begs, “before he asks?” The will to hide his fate is defeated by the sadness in her gaze, and Rumpelstiltskin’s eyes grow wide and fearful. Neal knows that he hasn’t the strength to say the words, not with the curse. Apparently he has no courage for anything, now.

“Bae… Emma did this to him to save him from a cut Excalibur gave him to the neck,” Belle explains, gently. Rumpelstiltskin’s eyes widen with horror, and he stares at Neal.

“A wound that won’t ever heal,” he murmurs, stunned, his lips numb with horror, his eyes wide. “I… she saved you.”

“She doomed me,” Neal corrects. “Papa, I’d rather be dead than be like this.”

“Don’t you dare say that!” Rumpelstiltskin says. “Don’t you dare, not now, please, Bae…”

“I can end this curse, papa,” Neal says. “I know how. I just came to…”

“To say goodbye,” Belle breathes. “You came to say goodbye.”

Rumpelstiltskin’s face slackens, fresh tears in his eyes, and he clings to his son, who hugs him back just as fiercely. “You can’t,” Rumpelstiltskin breathes. “Bae, Bae please, you can’t…”

“Papa it’s okay,” Neal pulls away, steps back, unable to bear his father’s tears. “I… this is worth dying for. The curse is fighting me but if this is it… this is worth it.”

“No, we’ll find another way,” Rumpelstiltskin shakes his head, refusing to listen. “We have to, we can’t do anything else.”

“Even if Emma had killed Zelena, I’d have died of the wound,” Neal reminds him. “I won’t survive either way. I think… I think knowing that is the reason the curse is willing to work with me. It has nothing I want except its destruction.”

He hadn’t been sure, not until he came here, that the lake is the best plan. But seeing his father’s face, knowing how it would devastate him to see the monster the curse would twist his son into… knowing that makes him sure. He can do this: he can die to destroy the darkness, to save his father that pain. He can open the portal to the Underworld and let the darkness return from whence it came.

“Please, Bae, please…”

“I’m sorry, papa,” Neal says, “I have to do this.”

“Wait!” Belle cries, her hand on his arm, and for a moment he has a strange flash of a memory, a memory that isn’t his – warmth, sunlight even in darkness, a steadying touch, deep breath, soft, pliant lips resting on his… and then weakness, overwhelming weakness, fear, panic, resurgence, NO! – bursting behind his eyes. True love’s kiss: Belle had had the darkness on the ropes, it is afraid of her. “Bae, give us a chance, okay?”

“You know what happened as well as I do, Belle,” he says. “You know what has to come next.”

“Fate can be rewritten,” she shakes her head, “I… wait, what happened to Merlin? You were going to kill me and Emma stopped you, and then I think I blacked out. Then we were back in Storybrooke, and Merlin was nowhere to be seen.”

“Merlin said I couldn’t be saved, remember?” Neal says, while Rumpelstiltskin stares at him.

“You were going to kill Belle, Bae?” he asks, horrified. Neal shakes his head.

“I… I wasn’t myself, papa,” he says. “I…”

“He was heavily under the Dark One’s influence, Rumple,” Belle says. “It needed a heart to cast the curse that brought us back, and as a Dark One’s true love I was apparently a match for the spell.”

“But you still have a heart,” Rumpelstiltskin says, softly. “You’re alive.”

“Emma split hers, and used mine,” Neal explains. Rumpelstiltskin looks murderous.

“She was busy, wasn’t she?” he murmurs, fires burning in his eyes. “Is there anything left of you that she hasn’t taken, son?”

“Neal?” Merida’s voice comes through from the shop, high and panicked. “Belle? Rumpelstiltskin?”

“We’re back here!” Belle calls, and a moment later Merida appears through the curtain, bow drawn and out of breath.

“You have to come quickly!” she cries. “The Dark One used her magic to restore the whole town’s memories and… bring a weapon!”

“What’s going on?” Belle asks, panicked, “Is it Emma?” Merida shakes her head. 

“It’s King Arthur,” Merida says. “His army freed him this morning, while we were distracted. They’re storming the clock tower, and I’ve fought these men before. They’re bloodthirsty and merciless.”

“If they take down Emma and her family, they’ll come for us next,” Belle says. “We have to go help them.”

“I…” Rumpelstiltskin takes a deep breath, and Neal sees him react to the pure trust in Belle’s eyes, the hope in her voice. He wants to prove himself a hero for her. He wants to show his worth and defend their home. “Of course. We must do what we can.”

“Alright,” Neal nods, summoning Excalibur while Rumpelstiltskin takes up a sword from the wall, and Belle finds her crossbow. “But after this… after this, I have to end this for good.”

“We’ll talk about that then,” Belle promises. “When we have the time. But for now… for now, maybe we need a little darkness. This curse destroyed your home, Bae. Now you can use it to defend it.”

Her logic, gentle and strong and provided with a reassuring hand on his arm, breaks through whatever momentary coma Neal was trapped in. The Dark One is impatient, antsy: desperate to be by the lake and have the ritual complete. But Belle is right. His little family has no magic now, except for him, and he will not sacrifice himself to defeat one evil, while another was left to butcher everyone he loves. He’s learned that lesson well: this sacrifice will not be for nothing

“Alright,” he nods. “Let’s go.”

They follow Merida out into the street, and around the corner, up to the clock tower. Arthur, apparently freed from his prison cell, stands with an army at his back. Guinevere holds a bow and arrow, the arrowhead pointed at Regina’s heart, while Zelena rests to Arthur’s other side, dressed in her customary black dress and hat, her arms folded and her lips twisted in a smug smirk. Neal hides them with a swift spell, and they come around the back of Arthur’s army, a whole horde of armoured knights, ladies with bows and arrows, and peasants with pitchforks. Every denizen of Camelot stands armed to the teeth, whipped into frenzy and desperate to fight for a new home under their psychotic King.

“Is this about your baby, Zelena?” they hear Snow’s voice echo. She stands beneath the clock tower, armed and flanked by David, Regina, Emma and Robin, with the rest of the town behind her. Neal leads Belle, Rumpelstiltskin and Merida to Emma’s side, and drops the spell, although he doesn’t think the leaders of either side really notice. 

“Glad you could make it,” Emma murmurs. “Where the hell were you?”

“You wasted your time searching for me, and you knew it,” Neal tells her. “I… how could you keep me in the dark like that, Emma? You took away any chance I had to make my own decisions.”

“You seem to be making them for yourself now just fine,” she retorts. “I wanted you to live, Neal. Like it or not, I’m not losing you again.”

“You don’t get a choice in that anymore. Where’s Henry?” he murmurs under his breath, scanning the crowd, but he can’t see his son. Safe, he hopes fervently, surely neither Emma nor Regina would send him into armed conflict, no matter his son’s heroic ambitions. He’s just a boy, a child, he can’t be here, he mustn’t be…

“With the fairies,” Emma tells him. “He fought us on that but for once Regina agrees with me. Blue won’t let him out of her sight. He’s safe.”

A knot in Neal’s belly unravels at that. Henry shouldn’t be here to see this.

“Oh, we’re so far beyond that now, dear,” Zelena sneers. “In addition to my baby girl, this whole town is ours now.”

“We have two Dark Ones as well as me, sis,” Regina says. “What makes you think you stand a chance?”

“What makes you think you can trust them?” Zelena retorts. “Emma’s been plotting against you since we got back, and this one,” her eyes slide to Neal and she runs her eyes over his form with a contemptuous glare. “This one could hardly light a match, he’s so afraid of his own power. They’re so desperate to be rid of their powers they can’t risk killing anyone. If either of them kills someone,” she giggles, strutting up to him as if she has nothing to be afraid of, her hand reaching out to caress the side of his face. 

Neal’s blood runs cold, forcing himself to hold still, to not break her neck as every impulse and nerve ending demands him to. “Then their souls will be consumed by the darkness,” Zelena croons. “No way back. No hope for their precious loved ones. Not that it matters. You’ll all be dead in five minutes anyway.”

He can hear the Dark One in his father’s form, leaning over his shoulder to whisper in his ear, “You know what to do,” it says, “you know how to do it. Kill her. She tortured you, tried to kill you, locked you away, controlled you, tormented your father into madness. Kill her.”

Neal shudders all over, his blood running hot and cold as he sees clearly in his mind’s eye how easy it would be to reach out, just reach out one hand, and choke her to death, watch the light finally die from those cruel eyes. He could rip out her heart and crush it; he could tear her skin off strip by strip, unpeeling her like fruit until she begged for death. He could make her pay again, and again, and again for what she’d done, and he knows he would enjoy every second of it.

“Do it!” the voice roars, and his hand rises, the magic summoned even as he tries desperately to resist.

Belle’s hand slides into his, silently, and she squeezes hard. The magic slowly ebbs away, and he takes a deep breath, even as Zelena smirks and leans in closer.

“Good luck fighting that urge, Baelfire,” she breathes. “We both know you can’t hold back for long. And when you do, I’ll enjoy watching your father see you fall.”

Rumpelstiltskin’s blade comes out of nowhere, pointed squarely at Zelena’s chest. “Lay one more hand on my boy, and I’ll finish what I started.”

Neal stares at him for a moment, unable to believe what he was seeing: his father, the coward, the crippled spinner, powerless and still holding a sword against a woman who terrified and traumatised him. For a moment, Baelfire is back on a dark forest path, watching in horror as a cruel soldier forced his father to kiss his boots to save his son’s life. Now it was Rumpelstiltskin standing tall, a hero at last, defending his child.

Zelena scoffs, but backs away a step, as stunned as Neal. “You’re not the Dark One anymore,” she reminds him. “That… honour belongs to your precious son. How does it feel Rumple, to have lost the one person you loved most in the world to your curse, the only person capable of really loving you? When it destroys him, it will have been your fault.”

“No, Zelena,” he shakes his head. “No, it will have been yours. If you’d never tricked him, captured us, hurt us, tortured us… if you’d never been born, then this wouldn’t have happened.” The words are somehow so much worse coming now, as they did, from the mouth of a man unburdened by darkness. They’re truthful, undeniable. For once – for once in his life – Rumpelstiltskin places blame squarely where it belonged.

He walks her back, his sword poised at her chest, and Neal doesn’t miss how Merida’s arrow trains on her as he walks, ready to take the killing shot if Zelena makes a move against him. He has a bodyguard now, it seemed, and for that too Neal is grateful.

“You see Regina back there?” Rumpelstiltskin continues, gesturing back to where Regina stands poised to fight. “You see her with her true love, her family, her friends? She has a soul. No matter what I did to it, no matter how terribly I blackened and abused it, or what terrible things she did as a consequence, she has a soul and it has shone through in the end. You don’t. There is nothing in you worth saving, Zelena, and there never was. You’re worthless, and sadistic, and entirely alone. Cora should have strangled you at birth. It would have been kinder.”

Zelena gives a wild cry of pure rage, and claws at him with her sharp nails, magic enhancing the blow and leaving deep scratches in his face. Neal feels her magic rushing, summoning fast as a green glow enveloped her hand and she goes in for the kill. He holds his breath: if he uses his power now, Zelena would feel it coming and only kill his father faster. He is powerless, defenceless, and watches with horror as Rumpelstiltskin’s sword drops from his hand, and clattered impotently to the ground, the life choking from him.

The arrow, loosed from Merida’s bow the moment Rumple is out of her sightline, pierces Zelena’s neck and goes in deep. The blood that gushes from the wound is thick and red – arterial, oxygen-rich, essential. She slumps to the ground with a sickening thud, her eyes bulging, her mouth gaping, her cries silenced. It only lasts a second, life to death, arrow to throat, thunder to silence, but it feels like an eternity.

For a moment, everything is quiet and still, a shocked hush falling over both armies. Zelena’s body lies where it fell, her blood still rushing from her neck, the arrow jutting from her flesh.

“Merida?” Rumpelstiltskin’s face is bleeding as he staggers back, and Merida lowers her bow just a little, looking him in the eye.

“Now we’re even,” she says, and he nods. Neal twists his wrist, and transports his father back behind friendly lines at Belle’s side.

Arthur roars, “You’ll pay for that!” 

Regina retorts, “Make one move and you’ll end up the same way!” Maybe there’s a tremor in her voice, grief for her sister or regret for her end, or maybe Neal is only hearing disappointment that Zelena’s death came by someone else’s hand. Either way, the threat on both sides is real, and both armies settle, glare, breathe hard. Neither side wants to make the first move, and for long moments a stalemate reigns. 

“She’s dead,” Belle breathes through the silent, dead air. “I…”

“She would have killed him, Belle,” Neal murmurs. “One moment later and she’d have snapped his neck.”

“I know,” Belle nods, “I know I just… I wish there’d been another way.”

“You killed my witch!” Arthur cries. “You saw them!” He turns back to his men, “They fired the first shot!”

Arthur’s army grows restive, grumbling their affirmative, and Neal sees more than one hand stray to a sword hilt. The dwarves and townsfolk do the same in response, everyone reaching for a weapon. Any moment, the attack will begin, and the silence will shatter, and everything will be noise and death. It feels as if everyone, soldiers and kings and civilians alike, held their breath to forestall that moment. 

“Why attack us now?” David demands. “You can’t hope to win without her.”

“We have blessed blades,” Guinevere replies, her rolling accent thick with vigour and zeal. “Merlin himself enchanted every one of them. You tore us away from our home, our kingdom. If we cannot return, we shall make our Camelot here.”

“We could have coexisted,” Regina says. “You were our guests.”

“Coexisted?” Arthur scoffs. “I am a king, kings require kingdoms. My people deserve better than your table scraps.”

A roar comes from his assembled soldiers, and Neal wonders how easy it would be to kill them all on the spot. Snap every neck, one by one, with a twist of his wrists, like soldiers in a peasant village, bringing the children home…

Merida draws back her bow again, this time pointed at Arthur. “You killed my father, y’majesty,” she said, and Neal’s eyes widen. “If you won’t surrender, you’ll go the same way as y’witch.”

She releases the arrow, but despite its true aim, Arthur’s sword sweeps out in a rapid arc, and slashes the arrow out of the air with lightning precision. “My queen did warn you,” he says, smugly, “blessed blades. We have light magic on our side – your darkness and your tricks cannot hope to defeat it.” He turns to the rest of Storybrooke, his blade high. “Surrender now, and you will be spared. Cast out into the rest of this… ungodly world, but spared. Fight, and you’ll meet the same fate as my witch, and this heathen’s arrow.”

“This is our home,” Snow spits. “We will fight for it until the end!” A cheer comes up from the Storybrooke fighters, all armed with whatever they have – what soldiers they have on one side, the dwarves on the other, a myriad others in-between. Ready to fight and defend, for an issue Neal had caused just by allowing Excalibur, now clutched in his hand, to graze his throat.

The two sets of leaders continue to trade bravado and insults, stirring their opposite numbers into stronger and stronger fervour. Meanwhile, Emma sidles to stand beside him, and he tries not to feel physically repulsed, remembering the part she’d played in this. She was meant to be this town’s Saviour, and instead they could all die fixing her mistake. For all the fairies’ and Regina’s power, if Arthur’s army have all been enchanted by Merlin then it is anyone’s guess who would win. And Arthur, it seems, does not mean to take prisoners.

“I can wake Merlin,” Emma murmurs to him. “The first person to fall, we take their blood and we can wake him. We just need the blood of a fallen hero. That’s what I used to seal him in the first place.” Her eyes slid to Belle with heavy significance, but Belle didn’t shrink at the memory.

“Fallen?” Belle frowns. “But I was just unconscious.”

“On the ground and incapacitated is enough,” Emma tells her. “Dead isn’t required.”

Rumpelstiltskin gives a hoarse laugh, and Neal winces to see the blood still running down his face from Zelena’s nails. He reaches a hand out to heal it, but Rumpelstiltskin holds out his palm to stop him. “Incapacitate me,” he says to Emma. “You can awaken me once the spell is done. With my leg I won’t be much help in the fight.”

“You are a true hero,” Emma murmurs, considering the option. “Even if you didn’t come by it honestly.”

“I fought a bear you created,” he retorts. “How much more honest do you want?”

“Will it work?” Belle demands, cutting through their bickering. Emma nods, curtly.

“It should. If I knock him out for just a moment, and take the blood, then I can re-awaken him and you can use it to wake Merlin.”

“Where is he?” Belle asks, and Emma shrugs.

“Where I left him: as a tree in the diner. A glamour spell is keeping him hidden, but if you know to look for him you’ll see him. He’s our only hope now.”

Rumpelstiltskin nods. “Do it,” he said, and Emma gave a half-smile.

“I’ve been desperate to knock you unconscious since I met you, Gold,” she says. “It’d be my pleasure.”

She waves a hand, and he slumps, Neal catching him swiftly in his arms and laying him down on the ground. Emma quickly summons a vial, and gathers the blood still weeping from his wounds, handing it to Belle once it is stoppered. “Quickly,” she hisses. 

Belle nods, and with a last look to Rumpelstiltskin, sneaks around the back of the library behind the fairies, and runs off in the direction of Granny’s. Emma leans over Rumpelstiltskin, and heals his injuries with a brush of her fingers on his cheek. After a moment’s consideration, Neal watches as her hand then reaches down to brush his ankle, and he wonders why he’d not thought of that already.

“Ow,” Rumpelstiltskin groans as he comes to, rubbing the back of his head. “You could have been a little more gentle.” Emma smirks, but helps him up regardless. He stands steady on his foot, the pain apparently healed, and he nods his thanks. “I suppose that makes up for the rough landing.”

“Go, now,” the Dark One hisses from behind Neal’s shoulder, distracting him. “If you do the ritual now…”

“Then we’ll be minus a fighter,” he retorts. “If I die here, you get a new host. I-“

“Don’t listen to it,” Rumpelstiltskin cuts through, his voice flat and uncompromising. “It doesn’t want to help you.”

“You don’t know that,” Neal replies. “I know it better than you did. I know what I’m doing.”

“No, you don’t,” his father informs him. “No one does. I thought I did, and look what happened – I lost you, I cursed the whole world, I killed hundreds of innocent people, I lost Belle and you all over again… and then there was the hat, the pirate, the Queens of Darkness… this curse doesn’t allow you to make good choices. It lies, it tricks, it manipulates: where do you think I learned it from?”

“We want the same thing,” Neal says. “We want-“

“It doesn’t want what you want,” Rumpelstiltskin tells him, without a moment’s room for argument. “It wants to resurrect itself, every incarnation. That’s its ultimate goal.”

“Don’t listen,” the Dark One whispers, “he’s a coward and a liar: you know this. He wants the power back for himself. He wants to distract you, until he can steal it away: he knows how to do it. He has the ingredients and the inclination. You honestly think he’d choose you over the return of his power? We both know how that choice goes, and you’re not enough, you’re never enough.”

“Please, son,” Rumpelstiltskin’s face is open and pleading, guileless. “Please trust me.”

“I…”

“You can’t trust him, Baelfire,” the Dark One reminds, every betrayal suddenly flashing again before Neal’s mind, as if he needs the reminder. “You never could. He was weak, he knew this could be done but he chose to keep the power. You’re stronger than he was. You can be the hero he never can be.”

“It wants you to die for it, Bae,” Rumpelstiltskin says, softly. “You know that can’t be right. And you know that no matter what, I’ve only ever tried to do my best for you. The last time I listened to it with regards to you… well, you landed in another world, all alone.”

“I just want to destroy it, papa,” Neal mutters. “We’ll have no peace while it exists.”

“Then live,” Rumpelstiltskin says, and takes his hand, squeezing hard and facing down the army before them. “Look at where we are, my boy. We’re facing an army, and I’m holding a sword, and you’re cursed, but we’re together. Nothing is the same. The curse took nothing from us we can’t now rebuild. But we have to fight it together.”

And for once, for the first time in a very, very long time, Baelfire believes his father, and clings to his hand for dear life. “Together,” he agrees, and he feels the Dark One’s influence receding, the way it had with Emma and with Henry.

“Attack!” Arthur roars, apparently done with the bargaining and bravado, the exposition of his plans, and suddenly everything is action, conflict. 

“Don’t kill anyone!” his father reminds him sharply, as they charge forward and are swept into the fray. He slashes at a soldier coming after him, and ducks back, hoping to avoid a full fight, to avoid – Neal supposes – killing anyone himself. “Bae, if you can help it, don’t lose yourself to this. Don’t be like me.”

Neal nods, and waves a hand, trying to use his magic to just knock out the soldier before him. He feels it: the spell ricocheting off the barrier Merlin had put in the way, and curses under his breath. Apparently this will be a real fight, then.

He raises Excalibur high, and the blade crashed against his opponents’, smashing it out of the way. Stun, he reminds himself, stun, and don’t kill. Don’t cut. The neck wound that will kill him, that is the cause of this whole mess, is testament to that danger. His opponent’s helmet crashes and clangs as the butt of Excalbur’s pommel collides with the side, and the man slumps down, limp and out cold. Neal begins to move through the fight in similar fashion, engaging and moving away, stunning but not cutting, not killing. He aims for the knights, the sworn soldiers: the peasants he tries to avoid, and the women mostly fire from a distance, out of his reach. 

Emma is doing much the same, fighting with her magic and her father’s sword, a svelte streak of black and silver in a crashing sea of muddy grey and brown. No one was uses a gun: Neal wonders why, but can’t regret it.

Snow and Merida stand on the library steps, firing their arrows with precision. David stands as their guardian, battling off any knight who comes close to his wife, and Neal can see the bodies starting to hit the floor. David has no compunction about killing, it seems, hero or no hero: three dead knights already lie at his feet.

Neal watches with sick fascination as Mr Porter, the butcher, slides off a knight’s blade with a sickening thud. Miss Fisher, the kindergarten teacher, holds her twin blades loosely in her slack fingers; her eyes seeing nothing and her body slumped at a knight’s feet. Storybrooke’s militia take heavy losses, regardless of Regina’s or anyone else’s protection.

They are not unavenged. The knights, too, fall left and right: Snow’s arrow nails one in the eye; another screams as he is burned alive in his armour by Regina’s fireball, snuck under Merlin’s barrier and inescapable. 

Guinevere and her ladies take similar positions to Snow and Merida, firing from the sidewalk. An arrow from Guinevere’s bow grazes Leroy’s arm, tearing through his shirt, and Neal hears his cry of pain, the clatter as his axe hit the asphalt road. Doc charges in in defence, his axe lodging in an attacking knight’s spinal chord. The cry is thick, a gurgle, as the dead man sinks to his knees, and Doc wrenches his axe back out with grim determination.

Neal ends up back-to-back with David, defending the archers. He is close by when an arrow from Guinevere’s bow sails through the air, and strikes Snow through the arm, through and through, blood seeping through Snow’s pale blue coat. 

The world seems to slow for a moment, as Snow White sinks to her knees. “Mom!” Emma screams, rushing to her side in a moment, too fast for the human eye to follow. Snow sinks into her daughter’s arms, but the arrow is only in her arm, not her throat, thank God. It shakes Neal to his core to see her shaking, bleeding, the danger suddenly real: he’d thought them untouchable, Snow and Charming and their ilk. Regina fights harder when she sees what has happened, her teeth bared and magic flaring with a vengeance, trying to force her way to Guinevere to make good the wound she’d given her friend. Blessed blades they may be: Neal doesn’t fancy their chances against her.

If Snow died, Emma wouldn’t make it out with her soul in tact. Neal’s heart races as he beat off two more soldiers: everyone seemed to be swarming, trying to break his and David and Merida’s defensive line and finish Snow off. He cannot see his father in the crowd. He hopes he is at the edges, and safe from the heaviest fighting. He hopes Belle returns soon with Merlin: if he can take off the spell on the knights, he and Emma can finally put an end to this madness.

“I’ll be fine, sweetheart,” Neal hears Snow gasp, gritting her teeth. “Get back to the fight.”

“I can heal it!” Emma cries, “I can do this!”

Emma instinctively lashes out her fist to the side, and knocks a rushing peasant unconscious: he’d been trying to get to Snow with a knife.

“It’s in too deep and you’re needed elsewhere,” Snow replies. “I can cope, go!”

David stays close to his wife, while Granny sets down her crossbow and comes to drag the fallen princess back, away from the battle, and bandage the wound as best she can. Neal flanks David, keeping guard, and so he hears the cry loud and clear when the David spots an old friend running in from the side, “Lancelot!”

“David?” Lancelot is in full armour, and runs over with his broadsword bared, ready for a fight. “How do you always find a battle? Shit, what happened to Snow?”

“She caught an arrow in the arm but she’ll make it, she’s refusing sympathy. Where’ve you been?” David demands. “We didn’t find you after the curse brought us home.”

“Hiding,” Lancelot explains, knocking the first knight who attacks him unconscious with his pommel, apparently following the same practice as Neal and trying not to kill. “But I heard the fighting across town. Arthur wants me dead, man.”

“Join the club,” David grunts, kicking off another man as Happy dives in with his axe, breaking the fallen knight’s kneecaps. Neal hears the crack, and shudders all over. 

He wants to slash, to kill, to destroy: every vein, every muscle, every nerve ending cried for blood. He envies David, Merida, the dwarves, envies their kills, their bloodied hands, the unfettered violence they are able to indulge in while he must abstain. Only the memory of Hordor and his men, collapsed on the ground outside his childhood home, his victorious father stood over them all, keeps him from doing so. The horror of the thought of those scales sliding over his skin, the world gone dark, is more than he could bear.

“I can stop this,” Lancelot tells David. “These men won’t follow him. No one else has to die.”

“How?” David demands. “They’re all loyal, they’re his knights!”

“I need to get to Rumpelstiltskin,” Lancelot tells him. Neal nods: he’s finally located his father, thankfully, circling the outside of the fight, his whole, slight body shaking in fear but teeth grit with determination. Emma meanwhile moves through the fray like a panther, sleek and tight, destroying everything in her path. Perhaps she has killed already, he thinks, but then they shared a heart: he would know, wouldn’t he, if his heart too had turned truly black? But with her mother injured, anything is possible.

He transports his father to his side in a moment, a rush of deep blue smoke. Rumpelstiltskin stumbles, disoriented, and Neal catches him and brings him back to balance. “Lancelot says you can help end this,” Neal tells him. “Is this your fault, papa?”

“No I… Lancelot?” He pales, and Neal wonders with a rush of fury what the hell he’s done to cause this. “I… I made a deal with you, didn’t I?” he asks, looking over the larger man, who nods gravely. “You and the queen.”

“The gauntlet for the powder,” Lancelot supplies. It’s cryptic as hell, but Rumpelstiltskin nods at the apparently clear memory.

“I take it Arthur got hold of it, then?” Rumpelstiltskin asks. “This is a fascinating use, if so. To make a whole kingdom appear whole.”

“Powder?” Neal demands. Lancelot explains.

“The magic powder makes anything broken appear whole, right? So I figure he used it on his marriage – which is why Guinevere’s at his side – and his kingdom – which is why they’re all crazy loyal and dying for him. If we can reverse it, they’ll wake up.”

“I have no magic,” Rumpelstiltskin shakes his head. “And we won’t reach the shop, not through the fray.”

“I can try,” Neal tells him. “I can’t die, remember? I’ll go. What do we need?”

Rumpelstiltskin swallows hard, trying to think, freezing and tensing as another knight comes barrelling at them, only to be engaged by Lancelot. “Blue powder, under the desk, third drawer,” Rumpelstiltskin closes his eyes, and recites from memory. “Makes anything appear as it truly is.”

“Thank you, papa,” Neal grins, and started through the fray. 

“You could kill him,” the Dark One advises, as Neal is swept into the heat of the battle and lashes out with the flat of Excalibur at a knight’s head. He goes down with a thud, helpless and groaning. “Now stab him, through the throat, make him bleed out.”

“No!” Neal cries, wrenching himself on through the battle, forcing himself to ignore every scratch and stab and wound inflicted by the flying blades and arrows. “I won’t, not now, I won’t do that to Emma.”

“You’re going to die anyway,” the voice tells him. “And she did this to you in the first place. If they survive, they’ll kill Henry.”

“They won’t win.”

“Not if you kill them all.”

The image of Henry skewered on Arthur’s blade flashes into Neal’s mind, so real he can almost smell the blood. He roars with agony, unable to deny how real that future could become, and swings Excalibur in a wild arc, the sharp edge cleaving toward its target: Arthur’s neck. He’s found the killer King, the man responsible for all this pain and bloodshed, and he cannot hold himself back from this one glorious blow. 

Arthur’s own sword sweeps in at the last moment, blocking Excalibur’s execution and saving Arthur at the last moment: blessed blades indeed. Arthur spins around, and grins when he sees whom it is he’s fighting. He steps neatly to the side, blocking Neal’s path to the shop door. “Not so fast, peasant,” Arthur spits, grinning around bloodied teeth. 

“You can’t kill me,” Neal grit his teeth, and swung his word again, parried, again, Arthur blocked easily: Neal’s blows are unpractised, scrappy, clumsy compared to Arthur’s clean, graceful sweeps.

“Perhaps not,” Arthur agrees, slashing for his belly, forcing him back, “But I can hurt you, I can delay you, and if I win that sword of mine back, then everything changes.”

Neal swings wildly out with Excalibur, but Arthur dodges the blow easily, counteracting with three quick jabs of his own. “I’ll slay two Dark Ones in one day,” Arthur muses. “You and your little girlfriend. Then I think I’ll take your father. He might be a cripple but there’s a lot of knowledge in that cowardly mind of his, who knows what he’ll tell me to save his worthless life before I cut his throat?”

Neal thrusts forward with his sword, slashing, hacking, desperate: Arthur’s counters hit their mark, but the raw power behind Neal’s attack – aiming to kill now, damn the consequences, damn Emma, damn death, damn everything –weakens Arthur’s defence. “Then your son,” Arthur grits out. “Little Henry. He gets saved for last,” he says. “I want all of his parents’ bodies present when run him through, so he can see what real power looks like before he dies. What a real King looks like.”

Neal’s own howls of rage and pain deafen to him, the agony and anger and pure unadulterated bloodlust overwhelming and finally sweeping over him, overcoming every rational impulse he has. With a final, deadly lunge every ounce of the Dark One’s strength rushes behind Excalibur, and the blade breaks clean through Arthur’s sword, shattering the blade and slicing into Arthur’s abdomen. Excalibur pierces his heart, and Neal feels Arthur’s ribs fragment and break with the impact as the blade sinks through his torso, his whole body breaking with the blow.

Arthur’s eyes are glassy, unseeing, frozen, his mouth slack. Blood trickles from his lips, and the king slumps to his knees, and slides backwards off Excalibur’s serrated, blood-drenched blade.

Neal feels it the moment the spell breaks: he can sense it in the air, ozone and a lightning snap, a golden rush. The knights, the women, all of Arthur’s people suddenly stop dead and lower their weapons, stumbling about, confused and alarmed, the bodies at their feet suddenly victims of a senseless massacre rather than a righteous war. The diminished Storybrooke militia do the same, thankful for an end to the fighting, even as they take in the devastation of their home.

Maybe Neal sees Guinevere catch sight of Lancelot, and fly into his arms, weeping and shaking. Maybe he feels his father draw near, clutching a wound in his side, or hears Regina calling out to the survivors and David explaining what had happened. Maybe Snow staggers over at her daughter’s side, one hand clutching her wounded arm. Maybe he senses the gentle healing magic Regina begins to apply to survivors – his father, Emma’s mother, Leroy. Maybe he can hear weeping, crying, grief almost its own entity as the town takes in the street littered with bodies and drenched in innocent blood. Maybe, maybe, maybe. 

None of it matters. 

He looks at his hands, and watches the infection spread, his nails turning dark where Arthur’s blood stains them, scales spreading as the darkness takes root. He’d given in to it, the hatred and the bloodlust, and the Dark One’s shade winks at him over Arthur’s corpse as it fades from view, moulding and becoming a part of him, blending into his soul and latching on: a permanent bind, until the death. He’s accepted its power, its cruelty, its strength, and used it to kill. Just one second, but that was all it took.

“Bae!” Belle’s voice rings through the still air, but it is too late, far too late. Belle and Merlin run to join Rumpelstiltskin on Neal’s periphery. It doesn’t matter. None of it matters. It’s all over now. All that is left is for him to die and end it for good. All that is left is to say his goodbyes, and make his way to the lake.

Emma’s hand comes to rest on his shoulder. “You killed him,” she states, softly, stunned, as if it needs saying. It does need saying. It breaks him out of his trance.

“He was going to kill Henry,” Neal explains, his voice shaking as he keeps staring at his hands. “Something else took over.”

“Bae,” Rumpelstiltskin crumples to the ground, defeated and shaking, weeping, grieving, and Neal sees Belle hold him, crouched beside him. 

“Baelfire,” Merlin’s voice is calm, soothing, pulling him away from the wreck he’s made of his father with one thoughtless blow. “You know what you have done?”

“I accepted the Dark One’s power,” he murmurs. “It was just a moment but… I used it to kill.”

“You also opened a new door,” Merlin tells him. “I… there is now something I can do. The blood on the blade is fresh; the first kill Excalibur has made as a whole weapon since Nimue first drew blood, and it is the blood of one of my chosen. It has a unique amount of power.”

“So?” Neal demands, furious at this false hope offered by a false saviour. “Get to the point!”

“Calm down,” Merlin orders. “You must be calm. If you can clear your mind, and channel the magic you used, your magic, through that blade coated in that blood, it will act as a conduit. You can draw all the dark magic into you.”

“I can be the vessel,” he thinks aloud, understanding at last.

“Neal, no!” Emma begs, standing before him, her whole face creased with horror, tears in her eyes. “You can’t, no, we can find another way!”

“There is no other way,” Neal shakes his head. “Not now, not after all of this. I’ll die to end this curse. I’ll die to save you. This always had to be the way.”

“Bae, please!” Rumpelstiltskin cries, but he can’t seem to get off the floor, for all his hand reaches out desperately to his son. “Please, you can’t!”

“I have to, papa,” Neal takes a deep breath, and closes his eyes, “I’m so sorry, but I have to do this.”

He raises the blade, and meets Merlin’s eyes, nodding. Merlin grimaces, and Neal knows this is the last ending the sorcerer had ever wanted to play out. But here they are, and this is it: the real ending, messy and awful and deeply unhappy. A real ending for the real world. He would have laughed at the appropriateness of that, if he had an ounce of humour left to him.

Neal takes a deep breath, and releases it slowly, channelling with it all the magic he has down the sword. He sees the thick black vines reach out, shimmering with tar and sin, calling for their kin. They latch onto Emma’s chest, and he feels the magic rear back, ripping itself back into him, covering him, smothering him as Emma’s back arches, her arms slack at her sides, the magic dragging out and out and out of her chest, drawn in by his own, until – at long, long last – it is gone. 

Her cheeks flush; her hair falls to her sides, tumbling and golden; her black leathers return to her red coat and jeans once more. She is cured. Saved. There is a peace in that: one last gift to her, a final apology, before the end.

Neal looks at his hands: green, mottled, scaled, worse even than before. He can feel the darkness roiling in him, smothering him, taking control. His heart seizes in his chest, turning black and cold and constricted, tight. He clutches his chest and falls to his knees, and his father catches him with desperate, grasping hands, easing his head back onto his lap.

“It’ll take over, papa,” Neal gasps. “It’ll take over, and then Emma can run me through, and it’ll be over.”

“Bae,” Rumpelstiltskin breathes, his hands in his son’s hair, cradling his head to his chest and rocking him like a child. “Oh, oh my boy. My brave, precious boy.”

“I love you, papa,” Neal gasps out. “I love you, and I’m sorry.”

“Neal,” Emma sinks to her knees, devastated, and he was thankful at least that he got to see them both one last time, as they always should have been: human and innocent and safe. He wishes Henry was here, but is grateful in a way that he is not: he will never have the memory of his father like this, scarred and scaled and weak, a killer, and dying in the middle of the street. No child should have memories like that. Maybe Henry’s absence is the best gift Neal could offer his son. “I love you, Neal,” Emma breathes, and Neal’s dying, darkened, broken heart sings to hear those words even now. “I’m so sorry… God, I’m so sorry. What have I done…?”

“It’s okay,” he gasps, reaching a hand to cup her face, his thumb stroking her cheekbone, brushing away her tears. “Shh, it’s okay. I… I love you, Emma. I always have. I love you so much, and please… please tell Henry I love him too. Take care of him.”

“I will,” Emma nods, fervently, tears flowing freely, her beautiful face creased with sorrow. “I promise, I will.”

“Bae,” Rumpelstiltskin weeps, and Neal closes his eyes at last as the darkness encroaches and his breath draws tight, tighter, the world fading around him. This is it; this is the end.

Rumpelstiltskin’s lips touch his forehead, a goodbye, an apology, a promise, a kiss of pure and honest and true love.

And for a moment, just a moment, the whole world stops.

Then Neal gasps, and shakes all over, his body trembling violently as the darkness fights back against that kiss, against the unexpected, inexorable light and the sun and the deep, true love it brings with it, brightening every corner and igniting every dark crevice. Light bursts through as Neal forces his eyes open, dragging breath into his lungs, clinging desperately to life.

“I love you too, papa,” he thinks, breathes, screams. He hears Belle gasp as if a long way away, and feels his father’s kiss again, and then another kiss, different but just as powerful on his hand. The darkness howls and shrieks and fights, but the light is stronger, the love is stronger, and it beats the darkness back and down and deep and out… and…

Belle laughs aloud, and Neal feels her kiss his cheek, and his father’s tears wet his forehead, and Emma is laughing too, weeping, holding him close, leaning down to kiss his lips over and over and over again. He blinks his eyes open, and Emma holds up his hand for him to see, beaming, happier than he’s ever seen her. His hand is pink, warm, human.

He has no magic, no power, and no driving urge to darkness, to fear and death. When he looks around, no scaled monster looks back.

“True love’s kiss can break any curse,” he hears another voice, stunned and wondering: Regina, coming down from above him. “Well, this is an ironic turn of events.”

He blinks up at her, and for all her cool disinterest, he sees her beaming too. 

“Bae?” Rumpelstiltskin gasps, “I… you’re alive! Bae!” He clutches Neal ever closer and rocks him, and Neal just holds onto his shoulders and hugs back. “You’re alive, my boy, my boy…” Belle is weeping too, and she all but falls on top of him, hugging him close, as Emma holds onto his hands for dear life and weeps for joy.

“But what about the cut to his neck?” Snow asks, bewildered. Merlin smiles at her, watching this outpouring of love and happiness with benign eyes.

“Excalibur’s magic is a curse like any other,” he explains. “With the Dark One destroyed, Excalibur has no reason to exist. Its spell is broken: it’s just a sword now, and its wounds are like any other.”

Neal reaches up, and traces the thin scar on his neck, the mark of an ordinary blade: a reminder, a memory, nothing more. “True love,” he murmurs, beaming up at his father. “Who knew?”

Rumpelstiltskin still seems beyond words. He reaches out and hauled his son close again, Belle and Emma holding on too as Neal tries to embrace everyone at once. 

There are a million things left to decide: what to do about Zelena’s child; how to accommodate the surviving Camelot soldiers; organising a funeral for all of those who had died for Arthur’s cruel ambitions. But for now, Neal is in the arms of the people he loves most, and the monster that had destroyed his life is finally banished, and things can finally progress, as they should.

Onward and upward: not a happy ending, but perhaps a happy new beginning.


End file.
